Nonfiction · 1708
The Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers
In 1708 a previously unknown astrologer named Isaac Bickerstaff published his predictions for the year, opening with a modest one concerning a rival: John Partridge, the almanac-maker, would die of a raging fever on the 29th of March at about eleven at night. On the 30th an account of Partridge's death appeared, giving his deathbed confession that astrology was a delusion. Partridge, who was not dead, said so loudly and at length in print, and was answered that the testimony of a man who had already been proved dead carried no weight. The papers collected here are the whole campaign, conducted straight-faced to the end.
Jonathan Swift wrote them to destroy a popular astrologer, and did — Partridge's almanac stopped for several years. The Bickerstaff name was borrowed afterwards by Richard Steele for the Tatler.
This Bibliomancer edition presents the papers complete.
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About this edition
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About the author
1667–1745 · Enlightenment
Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) was born in Dublin, educated at Trinity College, and ordained in the Church of Ireland; he was secretary to Sir William Temple in England, a Tory pamphleteer in London, and from 1713 Dean of St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin. A Tale of a Tub (1704), the Drapier’s Letters (1724), Gulliver’s Travels (1726) and A Modest Proposal (1729) are the best known of his works, most of which he published anonymously.
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