Definition:
A text or performance that uses irony, derision, or wit to expose or attack human vice, foolishness, or stupidity. Adjective: satiric or satirical. See also:
Etymology:
From the Latin, "medley," "mishmash," or "a dish filled with mixed fruits" (offered to the gods)Observations:
- "Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody's face but their own, which is the chief reason for that kind of reception it meets in the world, and that so very few are offended with it."
(Jonathan Swift, preface to The Battle of the Books, 1704) - "Satire is traditionally the weapon of the powerless against the powerful. One kind makes us chuckle about our foibles and our shared humanity--like what Garrison Keillor does. The other kind holds people up to public contempt and ridicule--that's what I do."
(Molly Ivins) - "Satire is a lesson, parody is a game."
(Vladimir Nabokov, Strong Opinions, 1973) - "[S]atire is tragedy plus time. You give it enough time, the public, the reviewers will allow you to satirize it."
(Lenny Bruce, The Essential Lenny Bruce, edited by John Cohen, 1967) - "[A]busive satire is a wit contest, a kind of game in which the participants do their worst for the pleasure of themselves and their spectators. . . . If the exchange of insults is serious on one side, playful on the other, the satiric element is reduced."
(Dustin H. Griffin, Satire: A Critical Reintroduction, University Press of Kentucky, 1994) - "Unruly, wayward, frolicsome, critical, parasitic, at times perverse, malicious, cynical, scornful, unstable--it is at once pervasive yet recalcitrant, base yet impenetrable. Satire is the stranger that lives in the basement."
(George Austin Test, Satire: Spirit and Art, University Press of Florida, 1991)
Pronunciation: SAT-ire
