rough draft

Zach Miller

Brit Lit B

Wilson

May 7, 2013

A Modest Proposal

            Jonathan Swift was a writer during the early eighteenth century who was known for using satire in his pieces. Swift used satire in his pieces to try and improve society and making people decent human beings. He did not enjoy Ireland because of the Roman Catholic natives and Scottish Presbyterian immigrants were people that he did not get along with. After becoming a priest, Swift wrote his most famous piece, The Modest Proposal, which was about the Irish culture during its hard times. Swift wrote a pamphlet that gave crazy solutions to the problems of beggars, starving children, shortage of money, and more that was going on in Ireland. He used vivid satire to hopefully shock the people of society and to make a change in society.

            In this piece, Swift uses verbal irony to persuade the people of Ireland of its problems. He uses the irony of parents teaching their children to steal until the age of six so that they could learn rudeness. Another thing that is ironic is the title itself. Swift proposes that they should eat their children once they are plump because it would decrease the number of useless children that are on the streets. He also proposed that you would sell the children too as food so the parents could make a good living. All of these proposals are not “modest” at all, they are quite horrific. With all of this being a satire, Swift is willing to make himself look like a crazy person to expose the gruesome behaviors of the culture of Ireland.

            Swift uses logical appeals to support his crazy propositions. He uses these logical appeals by providing six advantages for the people of Ireland. “I have too long digressed, and therefore shall return to my subject. I think the advantages by the proposal which I have made are obvious and many as well as of the highest importance.” (p.587 Elements of Literature)

            The six advantages say that the proposal will help with the bad economy they were currently having, parents wouldn’t have to take care of the children after a year, and married couples will get along better.  “Thirdly, whereas the maintenance of an hundred thousand children, from two years old, and upwards, cannot be computed at less than ten shillings apiece per annum, the nation’s stock will be thereby increased fifty thousand pounds per annum,” (p. 587). This is an example of one of the advantages that use logical appeal.

            Not only does Swift use logical appeal, but he also uses ethical appeal to persuade the people of Ireland. In Swift’s concluding paragraph, he states that, “I profess in the sincerity of my hearth that I have not the least personal interest in endeavoring to promote this necessary work, having no other motive that the public good of my country…I have no children, by which I can propose to get a single penny; the youngest being nine years old, and my wife past childbearing.” (p. 589)

            Swift is saying that he is trustworthy and has no ulterior motives because his wife can’t even have children no more and their youngest is already too old to be cooked. This is also ironic because he is using a tone that makes it seem like that the fact that he proposed of selling children as food was a great idea and that it could be something normal when really that is not good at all.

            Swift uses vivid satire throughout this persuasive piece to show that Ireland was going through a hard time. He uses irony, ethical and logical appeals to help support his satire. Jonathan Swift realized that people thought he was going to be crazy if he talked about a subject like this but didn’t care because he just wanted to prove a point and hopefully create change for the country that he lives in. He knew that if he went to the something of this extreme, that people would actually realize what was going on.