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1700Congreve, The Way of the World
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1700John Dryden, Fables
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1702Queen's Royal Cookery
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1704East India Company sales catalogue
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1711The Spectator
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1712Jonathan Swift, A Proposal...
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1715Sugar in Britain
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1719Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe
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1721Bartholomew Fair
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1724Trade and the English language
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1729Swift, A Modest Proposal
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1730East India Company: Bengal textiles
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1731English arrives in the West Indies
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1733Hogarth, Harlot's Progress
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1738Cities in chaos
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1738Polite conversation
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1738James Miller, Of Politeness
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1740Samuel Richardson, Pamela
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1742Advert for a giant
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1743Muffin seller
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1747The Art of Cookery
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1749Henry Fielding, Tom Jones
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1755Johnson's Dictionary
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1759Sterne, Tristram Shandy
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1762Lowth’s grammar
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1762Rousseau, The Social Contract
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1764Walpole, The Castle of Otranto
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1773Goldsmith, She Stoops to Conquer
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1775Captain Cook's journal
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1775Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland
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1780Burns, Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect
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1780Anglo-Indian newspaper
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1781Notices about runaway slaves
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1782First British advert for curry powder
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1789Storming of the Bastille
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1789Olaudah Equiano
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1790William Blake's Notebook
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1791Thomas Paine's Rights of Man
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1791Walker’s correct pronunciation
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1792Wollstonecraft's Rights of Woman
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1794Songs of Innocence and Experience
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Intro
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.
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