Seminar Paper:
Jonathan Swift: 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.
Jonathan Swift is an eighteenth century Irish writer who wrote a satire about the economic situation of the poor in Ireland in 1729. In it he offers a solution to the problem in the form of selling the children of Ireland as food for the rich.
He starts off in a very serious manner by describing how all the poverty stricken women and children are having to steal and beg to try to survive. This very sincere introduction serves to then shock the reader when Swift suggests cannibalism as a means to push the nation out of poverty.
One of the chief targets for attack in this article appears to be the ‘can do’ attitude of the public who were devising completely illogical methods for addressing the poverty situation. For example, the idea of running the poor through a joint-stock company was proposed at the time as a serious solution. Swift attacks this with an even more ridiculous suggestion, ‘I do therefore humbly offer it to publick consideration...twenty thousand may be reserved for breed...the remaining hundred thousand may...be offered in sale to the persons of quality and fortune.’
A modern day example of the style of satire used by Swift in his ‘Modest Proposal’ can be found in the animation series ‘South Park’ written by Matt Stone and Trey Parker. This TV show has a very similar style of humour. For example, in the episode ‘night of the living homeless’ the problem of the ever rising numbers of homeless people is exaggerated and a ridiculous solution proposed in suggesting they should all be shot in the head.
Swift displays a definite dislike for the wealthy in Ireland for thriving off the poor (despite being wealthy himself), when he writes ‘a well grown, fat yearly child, which roasted whole will make a considerable figure at a lord mayor’s feast’. His implication here is that the rich use the poor for their own benefit by making them work for long hours at an incredibly young age and for such a small amount of money that it doesn’t even cover their living costs thereby amplifying the problems of the nation.
The English had introduced a number of acts e.g. the navigation acts (only English ships could be used to export goods), the cattle acts (no cattle, sheep’s or pigs could be imported) and the woollen act (which forbade Ireland from exporting their woollen products) which were devastating for the Irish economy. Swift criticises these English policies with his comment that, ‘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 and wholesome food’. Here he is highlighting the injustice and the callousness of the selfish mercantilist strategy employed by the English which effectively crippled the Irish economy for its own gain.
Swift also draws attention to another big issue for Ireland at that time - the religious divide in the country. The protestant minorities united with the English in order to force through laws which essentially broke up large Roman Catholic estates: ‘It would greatly lessen the number of papists, with whom we are yearly over-run, being the principle breeders of the nation, as well as our most dangerous enemies...’ I believe it was Swift’s intention to use sarcasm strongly in this paragraph in order to outline the ludicrousness of the Irish siding with the English.
Questions...
What effect did Swift’s ‘modest proposal’ have on politics at that time?
Was the sole purpose of this article to make people aware of the economic situation in Ireland or simply just a comedic article used for entertainment?
Who were the target audience for this article?
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