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Satire is defined as the use of humor and exaggeration to criticize politics or current issues. “A Modest Proposal” was written anonymously by Jonathan Swift in response to the current treatment and economic trouble of the Irish in the 1700’s. Jonathan Swift manages to encase his readers into a horrendous but feasible idea of murdering poverty-stricken children to be fed to the rich. He uses a well thought out process of supporting details, adhering to the people’s needs, and straightforward, heartless attitude that make him seem like an expert in is field. This is why his proposal was taken with more than a grain of sand. Jonathan Swift’s proposal was seen as a cure-all since it aided both the wealthy and the poor of the time. The first way that Jonathan Swift managed to keep readers’ attention was to connect with them on a common level. Seeing beggars in the streets and starving families was a
Swift explains how the children can be made into exquisite meals and the leftovers, like the skin, can be used for gloves. He has every detail laid out from the ages of the leanest meat, and he supports all his claims with vague references to friends in distance countries and strange historical facts. However, he cannot do anything to help the elderly, ill, and disabled, which is a downfall in his plan, but problems are expected. The overarching prejudice to the poor is the theme of this satire since the landlords and wealthy have already “devoured” and drained the poor of all their wealth and belongings (paragraph 1, Swift). The wealthy live at the expense of the poor, but they are so disconnected from the poor that they are willing to support the idea of killing children to benefit themselves. Swift references America as already being open to eating children showing that this barbaric scheme is found in other untamed countries that might need England’s guidance (paragraph 10,
This was mostly done by his descriptions of preparing the children like they are a chicken, and his list of advantages to eating children. While describing how to prepare a child Swift said, “a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food.” The manner in which he described a human child the same way one would a cow, chicken, or fish. The obvious lack of ethics and morals in this passage cement that this essay is satirical and should not be understood as a legitimate solution to the starvation issue. He later listed the advantages of a system that breeds children for food, these advantages are all very unethical simply based off the fact that they are benefits of eating infants. Swift mentioned ideas including the murder of Catholic babies, eating humans as a fun custom, and giving the poor something of value (their own children). His use of ethos shows the audience that the essay is satirical and emphasizes the extreme ridiculousness of his ideas.
Imagine reading an anonymous work that promotes cannibalism! Swift eventually had to reveal himself and the purpose of his pamphlet, which was to exaggerate the steps necessary to stop the Irish famine and poverty epidemic. A Modest Proposal is almost a scare tactic. It brings attention to the distances people will go to stop hunger and homelessness. The audience of rich, land-owning men were expected to take the text to heart.
His solution is paradoxical in that eating children is beneficial for economic reasons, of which he lists in points of order with numerical calculations, yet raises further moral problems. Swift utilizes verbal irony in his writings to demonstrate a contradiction in his sarcastic proposal of eating children by dehumanizing certain people to achieve a constant expression of his own opinions. Swift’s proposal appears to be anything but “modest” as consuming children is irrational and absurd, adding to the sarcastic and humorous aspect of the work. He dehumanizes women by saying that they act as “breeders” and they can only pay for their children by “[getting] the value in scraps, by her lawful occupation of begging.” Rather than utilizing language on how parents should be able to have plentiful food, he states they “contribute to the feeding, and partly to the clothing, of many thousands.”
“A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift, is an essay that uses satire. Merriam-Webster defines satire as: a way of using humor to show that someone or something is foolish, weak, bad, etc.: humor that shows the weaknesses or bad qualities of a person, government, society, etc. “Satire may make the reader laugh at, or feel disgust for, the person or thing satirized. Impishly or sardonically, it criticizes someone or something, using wit and clever wording—and sometimes makes outrageous assertions or claims” (Cummings, 2012). Swift, best know for “Gulliver’s Travels”, originally wrote this piece as a pamphlet in 1729 under the full title ”A Modest Proposal: For preventing the children of poor people in Ireland, from being a burden on their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the publick.”
Through extreme hyperboles, Swift underscores the gargantuan social issues afflicting Ireland in the 1720s. While proposing a plan to solve all of Ireland’s problems, Swift explains that “a young healthy child well nursed is… a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled” (Swift 59-60). Swift exaggerates all of the effects of his plan, especially the supposedly tasty “boiled” child. Rather than simply stating that eating children would solve all of Ireland's problems, Swift goes on to list the many ways these dishes would be prepared. Even
The point where you see that Swift’s proposal is meant to be satiric is when he starts to talk about the economic gains of selling poor children. It is meant to be a point to address the exceeding amount of poor children that are being sold to slavery rather than an indication to cannibalism. A modern audience
In Jonathan Swift’s satire, “A Modest Proposal”, Swift writes about the starving people of Ireland in the early 1700’s. He makes a wild and absurd proposal to help remedy the problems of overpopulation and poverty. Swift wants to make a political statement by using the “children” as satire to grasp the attention of the audience - the English people, the Irish politicians and the rich – and make them aware of the political, moral, and social problems. In “A Modest Proposal”, Swift’s arguments are presented effectively by using pathos (emotional appeal), ethos (ethics and values), and logos (logic reasoning and facts).
Jonathan Smith goes to extreme measures to explain his new plan to raise the economic wellbeing of his country. He explains what age is too young and what age is too old, in order to eat the tenants children when they are at their prime juiciness. He also gives a list of suggestions on how to cook them, ?A young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled, and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a ragout.? All of this talk about eating children comes as a surprise because previous to this disturbing suggestion, Swift is ironically discussing the plight of starving beggars in Ireland. The reader is unprepared for the solution that he suggests.
This essay will have no value unless the reader understands that Swift has written this essay as a satire, humor that shows the weakness or bad qualities of a person, government, or society (Satire). Even the title A Modest Proposal is satirical. Swift proposes using children simply as a source of meat, and outrageous thought, but calls his propo...
It is a Satire because of the proposal Swift made; the Irish should eat and sell their babies to reduce the number of beggars with the goal of getting rid of poverty. Swift even suggests that the Irish should eat teenagers. Logos were used to convince readers of the this problem in Ireland. One of the Logos used throughout this Satire, is the persuasion of which the Roman Catholics are a danger to the Country of Ireland. Their so called danger is their financial loyalty to their church versus supporting their own families (Bryon Edgington), and as well as they are the fastest breeders. This made the Roman Catholics considered as beggars, because they were poor due to their loyalty to the church. These would be the children Swift is suggesting to eat. “It will have one more collateral advantage by lessening the number of papists among us.” (Swift 1394). Another Logo is revolving around the “poor” which are also considered as the “breeders”, the fictional speaker introduces the argument of assumption that the breeders understand and accept the guidelines of the proposal “Secondly, the poorer tenants will have something valuable of their own, which by law may be made liable to distressed help to pay their landlord’s rent,” (Swift 1396). This shows that fictional speaker does not care and have any sympathy for those of which who are poor. It may seem like this is not logical because why would
If Jonathan Swift had written a serious piece simply espousing his true beliefs he would not have received as much feedback, due to the fact that there were already informational advertisements at the time and nobody was interested in reading them. The only thing that would get the people 's attention was something that would create a lasting impression, so he wrote a satirical piece with trenchant humor and mochary. “A Modest Proposal” surprised people and got them thinking about the condition of the poor in Ireland and what should be done to solve it. For example Swift states that “those who are thrifty” can use the carcass of the infant for ladies’ gloves or gentlemen’s boots. This itself can help those reading the piece to begin to think about possible solutions to the substantial issues involving the poor in Ireland. He also proposes that children that are fourteen should be consumed as well so the poor don’t have to go hungry and that it would limit the number of breeders, in an attempt to illustrate the extremity of the circumstances. His sarcastic way of joking enlisted fear in the poor and concern in the rich, helping them realise the drastic issue present in the
Many authors disguise their criticisms of a government through satire in order to draw attention to political corruption and present it in a way that is more palatable to the reader’s taste. One such author is Jonathan Swift who, in his essay “A Modest Proposal,” presents the idea to raise Irish children as meat to feed the upper-class English elite. Swift establishes a satirical tone through his use of metaphor and sarcastic diction when he asserts his idea of consuming Irish children to starvation and poverty in Ireland. Swift’s use of satirical tone reveals the government’s failure to take the necessary action to alleviate the suffering of their people. Swift’s sincere regard for the Irish is revealed through an earnest tone, which makes use of empathetic diction when describing their struggles, as well as italics in order to highlight his serious tone when revealing his ideas to help the Irish.
In “A Modest Proposal,” Swift employs a satirical tone to mock both the callous attitudes towards the poor and the poor themselves. Swifts “modest” solution to the fiscal and social issues going on in Ireland is nothing but the opposite, as he proposes that the impoverished should sell their infants as food for money. In using the word “modest” to describe his proposal of eating Irish infants and/or offering their flesh as a source of clothing, Swift makes the sarcasm of his story evident from the beginning. By using such an inconspicu...
To this point the main driving force of Swift’s commentary was built around his outrageous proposal, one that comes off as so fantastical that the reader is just waiting for the “gotcha!” moment. However, instead Swift starts to use the grim irony of his proposal to build up and support his real intentions. Swift confesses that for more “thrifty” people the carcasses of the dead babies could be flayed, and the skin used to make admirable gloves for the “fine” ladies. Swift brilliantly lampoons the Irish upper class for their inability to take minor financial cuts in order to help the general good of society, especially by helping the poor. Instead he suggests that it would be “thrifty” to take the skin of the children to wear as gloves, something that would be the complete opposite of being thrifty as it would waste a human life. Swift also employs the use of loaded, in this case extremely patriotic,words and phrases in his diction to help highlight the irony of his writing. The best example of this can be seen when describing a conversation he had with a “deserving patriot” and “true lover of his country”(1290) who, upon hearing Swift’s proposal, offers his own refinement that poor children between the ages of twelve and fourteen to replace the supply of venison in the country. The use of those loaded phrases to describe someone who not only went along with Swift’s proposal, but gave his own refinement
“Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own” (Swift). Such beholders, as Jonathan Swift astutely emphasizes, are intended, through guidance of satiric narrative, to recognize social or political plights. In some satires, as in Swift’s own A Modest Proposal, the use of absurd, blatant exaggeration is intended to capture an indolent audience’s attention regarding the social state of the poor. Yet even in such a direct satire, there exists another layer of meaning. In regards to A Modest Proposal, the interchange between the voice of the proposer and Swift’s voice introduces another medium of criticism, as well as the opportunity for readers to reflect on how well they may fit the proposer’s persona. In such as case, the satire exists on multiple levels of meaning—not only offering conclusions about moral problems, but also allowing the audience to an interpretation of their place among the criticism.