In direct satire, a first-person speaker addresses either the reader or a character within the work (the adversarius) whose conversation helps further the speaker's purposes, as in Alexander Pope's "Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot" (1735).
Indirect satire uses a fictional narrative in which characters who represent particular points of view are made ridiculous by their own behaviour and thoughts, and by the narrator's usually ironic commentary. In Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels (1726) the hero narrating his own adventures appears ridiculous in taking pride in his Lilliputian title of honour, "Nardac"; by making Gulliver look foolish in this way, Swift indirectly satirizes the pretensions of the English nobility, with its corresponding titles of "Duke" and "Marquess."