Jonathan Swift is known as one of literature's greatest satirists. His experience in the fields of religion, politics and science allow his works to be considered brilliant in the world of writing. Swift's writing laid the foundation for several satirical successors. Swift was born in 1667 in Dublin, Ireland. His father had died “right before [he] was born” (Draper 3531). He was left “in the care of relatives” for the first three years of his life, while his mother returned to England to take care of business (Cody). Swift's parents, Jonathan and Abigail, were both Protestants. Religion played an important role in his life, which later led to his career as a Protestant minister. Jonathan Swift began his education at the age of six, when he attended Kilkenny Grammar School, “which was the best in Ireland at the time. "(Cody). He graduated from Trinity College when he was nineteen, but was not the best student in the school. Shortly after graduation, Trinity College closed during the Glorious Revolution. In 1689, Swift became secretary to Sir William Temple. In addition to becoming Temple's new secretary, Swift also met and fell in love with a woman named Esther Johnson Esther is best known as the “'Stella' of his famous Journal to Stella” (Byers 52). years younger than Swift. When Swift was 25, he "returned to Ireland to take holy orders" and it was here that he established his career in the Anglican church (Cody Swift had also begun to write several pieces in the genre of satire of his early satires include A Tale of a Tub which mocks Western Christianity. Writing a piece like this was very risky for Swift, especially because his position in any church would be jeopardized. The next...half of the article......wift truly deserves to be labeled "the most important prose satirist in the English language" (Byers 51). Works Cited Bloom, Harold. Jonathan Swift. New York: Chelsea House, 1986. Print.Byers, Paula K., and Suzanne M. Bourgoin. Encyclopedia of World Biography. [Volume 15], Studi-Visser. Detroit: Gale, 1998. Print.Cody, David. "Jonathan Swift: A Brief Biography." Np, June 2000. Web. November 17, 2013. Draper, James P. and Gale Research Company. Criticism of world literature. [Volume 6], Stoker-Zola, Indexes: 1500 to the Present: A Selection of Major Authors from Gale's Literary Criticism Series. Detroit: Gale Research, 1992. Print.Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver's travels to several remote nations of the world. Waiheke Island: Floating Press, 2008. Print.Swift, Jonathan. A Modest Proposal and Other Satirical Works. New York: Dover, 1996. Print.