Early on in this overly personal, rather jolly account of the life of one of the most enigmatic, complex and contradictory of Anglo-Irish giants, Glendinning announces: "what I am writing is not a chronicle biography. It is more like an extended version of what was in Swift's time called a `character' - a written portrait." No doubt this is to prepare the reader for the fact that she is not attempting a scholarly book. Swift is a fascinating subject, not only as an angry, ambitious individual with an unorthodox background, but as a reluctant Irishman who for a brief period played a heady role in the power politics of Regency England, was soured by his political frustrations, yet wrote masterful satire as well as passionately candid, often explicit verse. There is also his relationship with women, two in particular, and the ambiguity and secrecy which dominated those friendships. Glendinning's chummy tone and slangy prose irritate, as does her random approach to the man and the social history of the world he inhabited. Her endless asides, obtrusive conversational tone, speculative theorising about Swift's paternity and Stella's - "You do not have to believe the incest story. I had much rather you did not" - about his sexuality, obsessive cleanliness, etc., and her smug belief that she understands the Irish as well as the British and vice versa, are a trouble to the reader. This lightweight romp is no match for David Nokes's authoritative Jonathan Swift - a Hypocrite Reversed (1985), nor Bruce Arnold's highly perceptive and intelligent extended essay, published earlier this year.
