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A Modest Proposal By Jonathan Swift: An Analysis

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Supply did little to meet demand, so students regularly plundered graves in the name of learning. Fortunately for students of literature there is no need to go to such macabre extremes in order to further knowledge in their specialist field. Students of English Literature need only burgle the bank of literary treasures left to us by esteemed authors. One of these authors is Jonathan Swift (1667-1745), writer, poet and Dean of St Patrick’s, Dublin. Amongst the gems Swift left for dissection by literature students, is an essay published as a pamphlet in 1729 called A Modest Proposal. Through analysis of the text it becomes apparent that A Modest Proposal is a valuable piece of literature for study by an English Literature student. When first published it caused some minor ripples but the true value of A Modest Proposal, has been realised in later years and is now acknowledged as one of the greatest works of satire in the English language. By studying Swift’s life, the themes and characters he introduces into this work and the literary approach he adopts, it will become clear why this essay is of great value to the student of English …show more content…

The author’s use of satire is superbly honed in this essay. A satirical work ridicules stupidity in other people, and through the use of ironic language implies ideas that are the opposite of those expressed. No finer example than the Proposer of this story, considering cannibalising infants, as a “modest” suggestion for curing poverty in Ireland. Swift spares no one in this essay taking every chance to have a gibe. About landlords he says “I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children.” (Swift, 1729). So for the English literature student Swift is the master of satire and this essay is “generally considered to be the most famous satirical essay in the English language” (Nordquist,

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Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal,” examines the proposal of consuming human flesh in order to solve the dilemma of the Potato Famine, in which drought was exacerbated by crop failures, and this tribulation of the Irish was largely snubbed by English landowners. His ironic persona (speaker), is one of confidence, reason, and worth. In addition, this persona presents a multitude of rhetorical strategies to prepare the audience for this overly deranged proposal, ranging from juxtapositions, to using emotion, reason, and credibility, to persuade the reader. Therefore, the ironic persona in “A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift illustrates a wide assortment of rhetorical devices to convey the solution to the Potato Famine, and more broadly, Swift intended this ironic platform to serve as an expository of the avarice of landowners and their gain for self-interest.

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Swift shapes the text in a satiric way to portray to his audience his point of view on the topic at hand, and with the use of sarcasm Jonathan Swift mocks upper-class people who are affected by the overcrowding and poverty in Dublin. The usage of a satiric tone and sarcasm help Swift develop solutions to contemporary social problems that will work. In the “Modest Proposal”, written by Jonathan Swift, diction is a key rhetorical device in this piece, because of the way Swift portrays his thoughts through satire. Diction is the style of speaking or writing determined by the choice of words by a speaker by or a writer, Swift’s audience sees his diction as inhumane because of the way he proposes solutions to the world’s problems, such as in paragraph twenty one where he

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