Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) was an Anglo-Irish author, satirist, writer and cleric renowned as one of Ireland’s greatest English-language writers. His most famous works include the fictional story Gulliver’s Travels and the most critically acclaimed satire of English-language literature, A Modest Proposal. Although being part of the Protestant Ascendancy and thus detached from the Catholic peasantry that made up the vast majority of the country, Swift often wrote essays and pamphlets in defence of Irish industry and self-governance, and his writings influenced more advanced Irish nationalists such as Wolfe Tone, John Mitchel and Arthur Griffith.