A Modest Proposal By Jonathan Swift

Today we live in an age of satire, in which everything we see is so readily parodied that we often begin to lose the meaning of such an act in the first place. However many of these modern satirists do have points that they wish to make, as well as inspirations for doing so. Arguably one of the biggest influences on satire as we see it today was none other than the Irish author Jonathan Swift. Swift’s style of writing was iconic and very often ageless, as he frequently merged the general and specific in order to create cutting commentaries on the issues of the world. In particular he was known for his use of irony, parody, and personas in order create claims while remaining detached from them as an author and leaving his reader guessing as
The first and likely the most well known is his essay “ A Modest Proposal” which was written to address the population and poverty problems in Ireland at the time of it’s publication. This piece was aimed at both common folk and government alike and used the satirical message of how the Irish people should adopt cannibalism to disguise it’s message about how the Irish government was failing and how he felt the people should react. Second is an excerpt from Swift’s book “Gulliver’s Travels”, which is about a man who suddenly finds himself on an island of tiny people and becomes entangled is their issues. This piece provided an outside look into the seemingly arbitrary and ridiculous arguments of government that was meant to make the common people rethink the validity of their government and it’s issues. Finally we have “ Meditations on a Broomstick” which is an excerpt from Swift’s book titled “ The Battle of the Books”. In this piece we witness our speaker contemplating the nature of a broomstick and how it relates to humankind. This particular excerpt is much more frank in stating it’s views and offers a negative view of man on which the reader
In particular Swift’s writings made many inquiries into the nature of politics and the morals behind it. This could be credited to the fact that he spent 10 years working under the english statesman Sir William Temple (Source 1). It is also quite noteworthy that many of Swift’s writings, particularly “A Modest Proposal”, follow many of the teachings of the classic rhetoric and structure from his time (Source 3, Page 2). This also comes as little surprise as Swift received a variety of classical literary training from his time within both Kilkenny Grammar School and Trinity College (Source 1). Finally SWift’s frequent messages of disdain towards the Irish government can largely be attributed to the events of his time. In particular the overthrowal of the king of Ireland, England and Scotland in what became known as the Glorious Revolution of 1688, spurred a time of great turmoil in Ireland that would eventually lead to an Irish rebellion after Swift had passed (Source 1. Source 3, Page 2).Taking all these into account Swift’s particular themes and disdain for the Irish government were certainly