Author of A Modest Proposal, Jonathan Swift has a different writing style than most writers. In A Modest Proposal, Jonathan Swift has a sarcastic tone. He is tired of the U.S. government not taking poverty seriously and takes a different approach than anyone would expect. His “proposal” is to eat children under two years old to prevent them from becoming a burden to their parents. A Modest Proposal shows a different perspective on the government and selfish people with money.
Jonathan Swift was born into a poor family that included his mother (Abigail) and his sister (Jane). His father, a noted clergyman in England, had died seven months before Jonathan's birth. There is not much known of Swift's childhood, and what is reported is not always
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agreed upon by biographers. What is accepted, however, is that Jonathan's mother, after the death of her husband, left the children to be raised by relatives (probably uncles), while she returned to her family in England (Leicester). It is also reported that Swift, as a baby, was taken by a nurse to England where he remained for three years before being returned to his family. This is open to conjecture, but the story contributes to the lack of information available regarding Swift's childhood. "Gulliver's Travels." Jonathan Swift Biography. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. 2017. . Between the years 1696-99, Swift wrote two major works: Tale of a Tub, defending the middle position of the Anglican and Lutheran churches, and Battle of the Books, taking the part of the Ancients (those who believed in the superiority of the classics and the humanities) against the Moderns (those who upheld the superiority of modern science, modern scholarship, modern politics, and modern literature).
In The Mechanical Operation of the Spirit (1704), Swift continues his satiric attack on both questionable religious views and questionable knowledge acquisition, particularly scientific knowledge. In Argument Against Abolishing Christianity, Swift shares his reactions to the Test Act, a law enacted by Charles II, requiring office holders to declare their allegiance to the king over the church. The Journal to Stella (1710-1713), a series of letters written by Swift to Esther Johnson and Rebecca Dingley, includes the poem "The Windsor Prophecy," a satirical attack on the person and personality of the Duchess of Somerset, Queen Anne's red-haired attendant who did not care for Swift because of disparaging remarks Swift had written about her family. "Gulliver's Travels." Jonathan Swift Biography. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Mar. …show more content…
2017. Jonathan Swift is one of the most renowned authors and political writers of the 18th century.
Swift was able to grasp his audience’s attention through A Modest Proposal by satire; essentially he was fed up with the ineptitude of Ireland’s politicians, the degrading poverty in which an overwhelming number of Irish citizens found themselves, the boisterous tyranny of the British, and the hypocrisy of the wealthy. Swift expressed his disgust with the current state of Ireland and proposed that both the English, as well as the Irish, were to blame for the nation’s state. Swift’s essay was organized by presenting an immediate shock to the audience, suggesting that the nation should harvest the impoverished people’s babies for eating. After the initial shock, Swift presented a series of surprises that caused the audience to critically think about the current government policies and the true crisis in which the country found
itself. Swift makes many evident blows to the upper class and wealthy citizens of England throughout his essay. Towards the end of the piece Swift produced six main points, the most shocking of which explained how harvesting and breeding poor babies will make a great fortune for all of the taverns in the nation, “having their houses frequented by all the fine gentlemen, who justly value themselves upon their knowledge,” allowing the guests to contrive to make their meals as “expensive as they please.” (Swift, 2435.) "Jonathan Swift's Lasting Legacy: How A Modest Proposal Impacts the 21st Century." British Literature 1700-1900, A Course Blog. N.p., 03 Mar. 2014. Web. 04 Apr. 2017
“A Modest Proposal” was written in 1729 by a satirical author by the name of Jonathan Swift. Swift studied at the University of Oxford and was also know for his popular writing in Gulliver’s Travel. The purpose for his satire “A Modest Proposal” was to enlighten the citizens of Ireland about their hardship and suffering. He informed them about their scares of food, money, and property, but provided a possible solution to their problem. To persuade the people Swift adopts a comforting and friendly tone to his audience for the people to react to his solution.
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
In the time frame that Swifts’ A Modest Proposal was written Ireland was going through political, economic, and religious struggles. In 1729 England had contrived, with the help of Irish venality, to wreck Ireland’s merchant marine, agriculture, and wool industry. Prostitutes in Swift’s paper are having kids like senseless people, but yet they can’t afford to feed them. Jonathan Swift proposes that his people should sell the babies and eat them. He thinks this would help solve the problem of over population. Swift tried to give his people pamphlets on how to fix the problem that was plaguing their country, but they ignored them. Swift says “These mothers, instead of being able to work for their honest livelihood, are forced to employ all their time in strolling to beg sustenance for their helpless infants.”(1) Swift proposes that the mothers sell the babies for 8 shillings; the rich would find the child to be a delicacy and the extra money would go to the landlord. So everyone would benefit from this proposal. He does this as a way of making his people aware of what is going on in their
Sarcasm and Irony in Swift's Modest Proposal. In his lengthy literary career, Jonathan Swift wrote many stories that used a broad range of voices that were used to make compelling personal statements. For example, Swift, A Modest Proposal, is often heralded as his best use of both sarcasm and irony. Yet taking into account the persona of Swift, as well as the period in which it was written, one can prove that through that same use of sarcasm and irony, this proposal is actually written to entertain the upper-class.
Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” is a classic piece of satire written in an attempt to draw attention to a serious problem. He does extremely well in providing proof that his solution will be beneficial and instructions as to how it would be implemented. Overall, Swift wrote this proposal to get the people of Ireland to take their predicament seriously and inspire people to come up with solutions that are sincere and will have a lasting and uplifting effect on the country.
The Effectiveness of A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift "A Modest Proposal for preventing the children of poor people in Ireland from being a burden to their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the public" - Jonathan Swift 1729. In reading this you will discover the answer to the above question in three parts; · How effective is it as an argument · How effective is it as a piece of information · How effective is it as satire "A Modest Proposal" first appeared in public in 1729, Swift wrote this article after all of his previous suggestions had been rejected by the Irish authorities. Swift felt the English government had psychologically exiled him and this greatly added to the rage he felt over the way the Irish People were treated or rather mistreated by the English. Although Swift's highest and most prominent concerns were for his own class, the Anglo-Irish, he in the end spoke for the nation as a whole.
His very different tones throughout “A Modest Proposal” helps the reader realize that the essay’s idea is absurd. Swifts tone at the beginning of the essay is very sympathetic towards the people of Ireland, but his sympathy hastily goes away when he suggests his idea. Swift changes the tone of the essay so drastically it shocks the readers by making “A Modest Proposal” very ironic to its name.
To start off, the full title of Johnathan Swift’s writing is "A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People from Being a Burthen to their Parents, or the Country, and for making them Beneficial to the Publick." From just reading the title of the book “A Modest Proposal”, I was thinking it was a story about romance and how a gentleman proposed marriage to his female lover. His proposal, in effect, is to fatten up these undernourished children and feed them to Ireland's rich land-owners. He does this to illustrate how backwards and bad the state of Ireland is and the social classes. For these reasons, he looks at the politicians to blame for the poor conditions because of the apathy they presented while in the decision making process, to resolve the conditions.
He wanted to shock his readers by proposing his “modest” proposal. He presents selling babies as food to reduce overpopulation. This causes the reader to disregard this suggestion. Swift wanted to raise awareness on the issue that was haunting Ireland. Throughout A Modest Proposal, Swift effectively uses verbal irony, diction, and sentence structure to achieve his purpose of making people realize that there are problems in society that need to be handled in a reasonable manner.
A Modest Proposal is a satirical essay written by Jonathan Swift in order to prevent the children of poor people in Ireland, from being a burden to their parents or the country, and make them beneficial to the public; yet in actuality suggest methods to help the impoverished Irish. In the essay, Swift takes on a droll tone in order to convey outrageous solutions allowing him to state his real solutions to people of England.
Jonathan Swift was born in Dublin, the setting of his satirical piece “A Modest Proposal”, which criticized the conditions that the poor citizens of Dublin faced. Before he wrote “A Modest proposal” one of his first pieces was “Miscellanies in Prose and Verse”. Though this piece was not satirical, from the beginning, Jonathan wrote about the problems that were faced in society, and suggested some proposals in hopes to solve these problems. As a child, Jonathan swift was raised with his mother in Dublin. Since she was a single mother, she often had to turn to other people for financial support. Though the famine that Jonathan swift talked about in his piece “A Modest Proposal” wasn’t as prevalent during his childhood, he was able experience some form of poverty.
In the essay, A Modest Proposal, the speaker is Jonathan Swift. Swift is most known for his satirist writing style which is also evident in his novel called Gulliver's Travels. Swift was an intelligent Oxford graduate student who published his famous piece, A Modest Proposal, in 1729. In this piece he addresses the issue of poverty in Ireland by proposing a humorous solution. The purpose of his text is to shock his audience by his over the top solution to end poverty. Swift adopts a persuasive tone in his proposal to convey his readers that his solution would be beneficial.
Taking back in 1972, Dr. Jonathan Swift, an Anglo-Irish essayist, argues in his satire, “A Modern Proposal,” the economic issues within Dublin, the capital of Ireland, which consists of poverty and overpopulation, consequently, creating a dreadful blanket over the society as a whole. Swift then decides to provide an ironic metaphorically inhumane solution, by one of which, highlights the matter at hand in Dublin, Ireland. He achieves this by using the following rhetorical devices: diction to express the unimportance of the poor and gruesome actions used towards them, allusion to refer to a similar practice such as cannibalism, and hyperbole to give the solution a horrid effect in hopes of introducing it in a greater understanding.
The Writings of Jonathan Swift; Authoritative Texts, Backgrounds, Criticism. edited by Robert A. Greenberg and William Bowman Piper. Norton Critical Editions. New York: Norton, 1973.
Swift wrote ‘a Modest Proposal’ to draw peoples attention to the discrimination against Irish Catholics. I will now consider the use of satire in swift’s text a ‘Modest Proposal’ five satirical techniques: unexpected words, exaggeration, reversing what is expected, and odd or inappropriate comparison or analogy and finally to start off believable. An example of this is ‘ it is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town’ this is a believable start to the book. It makes it sound like a biography, another example is when he mentions about eating babies ‘a healthy young child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food.’ This turns the book around. This makes people want to read on because of that one line.