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Swift wrote plain perfection of prose. Comment. Many critics like William Deans Howells; T.S. Eliot etc. have called Jonathan Swift the greatest writer of prose like T.S. Eliot says that "Swift, the greatest writer of English prose, and the greatest man who has ever written great English prose." But there are reasons for this greatness. One of the main reasons is that Swift wrote in a very plain and downright style. He didn't …

…ses someone, it's a strategy of irony and Swift manipulates this praise for his own satiric ends. So the main reasons why Swift's prose is plain perfection is that he writes in a simple manner, uses common language, he uses imaginary and non-sensical words and gives authenticity to these words, the use of archaic language to give authenticity, the description of everything up to the minutest detail and the way in which Swift uses satire.