Swift's Satirical Response to Hunger in Ireland

 

Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal”

 

            Throughout Ireland’s history, many people have suffered from poverty and starvation from the unjust actions of the upper classes of England and Ireland. After reading Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal”, I was able to observe how Jonathan Swift effectively manipulated his argument into satire to persuade the audience with a different method. Swift’s argument reveals the helpless lives of the many poor who are confined to poverty because of certain policies placed upon them. Instead of attacking opposing opinion, Swift’s argument presents an absurd conclusion to end the problem of poverty and starvation of the Irish in attempt to demonstrate the wrongs of the upper class.

            Throughout Swift’s argument, he demonstrated an idea that would possibly cure the poverty of the Irish, but the idea was construed with a system that involved selling human meat for food. For example, Swift stated in his argument, “I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well-nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled…” Obviously this idea is absurd, but Swift used this method to ridicule the upper class by demonstrating how the lower class suffered from conditions that they could not escape. Swift made a direct appeal to the upper class by stating, “I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of their parents, seem to have the best title to the children.” On the other hand, why would the upper class of England and Ireland care for the needs of the poor when they do not suffer the same conditions? Jonathan Swift cared for the needs of the poor and desired to enlighten to readers the true cause of the poverty which he executed tremendously well.

 Works Cited

Swift, Jonathan. “A Modest Proposal.” 1729. Quotidiana. Ed. Patrick Madden. 19 Dec 2007. 26 Mar    2021 <http://essays.quotidiana.org/swift/modest_proposal/>.

Nothing Funny About Swift's "A Modest Proposal"

            Johanthan Smith's “ A Modest Proposal” does not effectively persuade that audience

 about the poor because it takes poverty lightly and was ultimately ineffective. It did not cause an

 economic shift for Irish people. Also, it further perpetuates that poor people deserve to be

 treated by higher class society. Poor people are already the butt of jokes by upper class

 individuals. Why add to this insult? Instead of making jokes about lower class citizens, literature

  should encourage people to be better members of society because words hold power. 

             According to James Kelly in “Harvests and Hardship: Famine and Scarcity in Ireland in

 the Late 1720s,” there were at least 85 subsistence crises and famine in Ireland in 1290-1890.

 Poverty was prevalent before the satirical essay was published and after it was published.

 Further the famine that occurred from 1740-1741 acquired more attention than in the late 1720s

 (Kelly 1). To add to this information, poor people were regarded as dirty and were unsupported.

 Many adults and children died of starvation. An essay about these children being eaten is

 insensitive. The essay is unnecessary and does not take into consideration the struggles of the

 poor.  -Peaches Andrews

Kelly, James. “Harvests and Hardship: Famine and Scarcity in Ireland in the Late 1720s.” Studia Hibernica, no. 26, 1992, pp. 65–105. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/20494987. Accessed 28 Mar. 2021.