Congreve, The Way of the World
John Dryden, Fables
Queen's Royal Cookery
East India Company sales catalogue
The Spectator
Jonathan Swift, A Proposal...
Sugar in Britain
Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe
Bartholomew Fair
Trade and the English language
Swift, A Modest Proposal
East India Company: Bengal textiles
English arrives in the West Indies
Hogarth, Harlot's Progress
Cities in chaos
Polite conversation
James Miller, Of Politeness
Samuel Richardson, Pamela
Advert for a giant
Muffin seller
The Art of Cookery
Henry Fielding, Tom Jones
Johnson's Dictionary
Sterne, Tristram Shandy
Lowth’s grammar
Rousseau, The Social Contract
Walpole, The Castle of Otranto
Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer
Captain Cook's journal
Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland
Burns, Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect
Anglo-Indian newspaper
Notices about runaway slaves
First British advert for curry powder
Storming of the Bastille
Olaudah Equiano
William Blake's Notebook
Thomas Paine's Rights of Man
Walker’s correct pronunciation
Wollstonecraft's Rights of Woman
Songs of Innocence and Experience
In 1712, the English language, according to satirist Jonathan Swift, was in chaos. He outlined his complaints in this public letter to Robert Harley, leader of the government, proposing the appointment of experts to advise on English use. The model was to be based on that of the Académie Française, which had been regulating French since 1634. His proposal, like all the others, came to nothing. To this day no official regulation of the English language exists.
On these pages
The aim of Swift's proposed academy is given on page 31: 'some Method should be thought of for ascertaining and fixing our Language for ever'. The section before suggests how this might be done, for example by rejecting 'very defective' grammatical forms and restoring some antiquated words 'on account of their Energy and Sound.'
Jonathan Swift, A Proposal for Correcting, Improving and Ascertaining the English Language, 1712.
Shelfmark: 117.b.22.