One of the most famous satirical pieces of all time is Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal. Although the issues contained within the text are aimed specifically at the political and economic situation in Ireland and England during the early eighteenth century, the thematic ideas that Swift develops so effectively in his work remain important to this day. Swift utilizes satire and wordplay to underscore the oppression of the Irish by the English, and in doing so, creates one of the longest-lived pieces of social and political satire and sustained irony of all time.
Religion in England, Ireland, and Scotland during this time was a particularly contentious subject; the Church of England and the Catholic Church were continuously at loggerheads, and the English Crown and Parliament were unwilling to accept into its ranks a bevy of poor, hungry Irish Catholics, for fear of social unrest or even uprisings (Quintana, 1965). As a result, Irish power in England was limited, as was its ability to do trade and govern itself independently.
Although Swift seems to have considered himself English, he expressed great sympathy in his work for certain causes, and championed some of the more important issues facing the Irish poor (Quintana, 1965). He was particularly concerned with economic issues, although he attacked many different political and social issues that he saw as problematic in his large body of work.
As he became more politically, economically, and socially aware, Swift began to engage more in Irish politics. In the decade leading up to his authorship of A Modest Proposal, Swift spent much of his time writing a large body of work that dealt with the economic issues and hardships that England was causing the poor Irish population (Quintana, 1965).
Even as he completed some of his best-known satirical works of all time (Gulliver’s Travels, for instance), Swift was keenly aware that conditions within Ireland were worsening rather than getting better. Swift wrote his treatise on the poor in Ireland in the manner at which he excelled: satirically and ironically. However, his treatise did not have the effect that he had hoped, particularly on the wealthy inhabitants of England (Quintana, 1965). Whether by design or due to sheer disinterest, those whom the pamphlet was directed at were not shocked, appalled, or even particularly affected (Quintana, 1965).
Regardless of whether or not Swift’s treatise on economic and social issues in Ireland was effective in the social climate of the time, however, does not lessen the impact or the strength of the text itself. Today, readers can look back on the times and the social climate and understand Swift and his intentions more thoroughly than the social elites could during his time; it is unfortunate that the text never had a far-reaching effect on the social climate of the day.
Many people during this time were under-educated or even completely illiterate; the spread of information was slow, and many people were potentially not even aware of how and why a writer would use irony and satire to express distaste for a culture or sociological phenomenon. In addition, many people had never traveled to Ireland, and perhaps had no social or cultural context on which to base Swift’s underlying themes and issues.
Swift wields the idea of the “other” quite effectively within A Modest Proposal, in two similar but distinct ways. First, he quickly and effectively delineates the “in” crowd from the “other,” by saying: “I think it is agreed by all parties that this prodigious number of children in the arms, or on the backs, or at the heels of their mothers, and frequently of their fathers, is in the present deplorable state of the kingdom a very great additional grievance” (Swift, 1729). This sentence, which is written in the second paragraph of the treatise, serves a twofold purpose: first, it allies Swift with the elite of England and Ireland. He is appealing to their sensibilities as a group, which is what makes this treatise so effective.
The second purpose is equally important: by aligning the elite with each other, he has created an “out” group, or what will be referred to as the “other.” He has not, at this point in the piece, elaborated on exactly what makes them the “other;” however, anyone within the culture would recognize that these individuals are of a lower socioeconomic class, and certainly not individuals that they would want as a part of their exclusive, affluent society.
The sneaky detail of the “prodigious number of children” is also a mark of Swift’s genius; Catholics were, at the time, stereotyped by society as having a large number of children. Swift later echoes this sentiment much more explicitly, stating: “For first, as I have already observed, it would greatly lessen the number of papists, with whom we are yearly overrun, being the principal breeders of the nation as well as our most dangerous enemies; and who stay at home on purpose with a design to deliver the kingdom to the Pretender” (Swift, 1729). Not only are the Catholics the enemy on Earth, they are the spiritual enemy as well, according to the speaker. With a single sentence, Swift has built a solid foundation upon which to build his entire argument, and maintains the foundation through an impressive display of logical and satirical gymnastics.
There were a number of confused and somewhat-backward political and social philosophies that were prevalent during Swift’s time. On the one hand, religion taught that giving alms to the poor was a civic and spiritual responsibility, but on the other, popular political theory at the time taught that the poor were in such a state due to their own actions and failure to work (Ferguson, 1962).
These competing social mores allowed the wealthy to give alms to the poor, and simultaneously feel as though they had done something altruistic and worthwhile; they did not, however, contribute to a culture or social climate that encouraged understanding of social classes or sympathy for those in lower social or economic stations. It was a culture in a state of turmoil and change, moving from one overarching ethical and moral philosophy to a different one.
Similarly, only those with the highest level of education would recognize Swift’s work as a carefully-crafted piece of satire, modeled after the famous Latin satirists (Phiddian, 1996). Swift used a variety of rhetorical strategies to clue the reader into his intention in writing the piece, but the readers themselves may have been less educated than he had hoped. This may have led to a general disinterest in the piece, or perhaps an assumption that Swift was slowly losing his mind.
Perhaps this is why, then, Swift’s satire fell upon deaf ears, particularly when it is such a well-crafted satirical essay. In building the foundation for his argument, he writes: “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; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout” (Swift, 1729). Anyone reading this piece would have been agreeing with Swift until this point; perhaps even vehemently agreeing with him. The numbers he presented to the reader as to unwed mothers and their children were, indeed, problematic to the higher classes; many members of upper-crust London society saw the poor as a blight that needed to be cleaned from the streets. However, even to the most staunch capitalist, eating the poor would have given them pause.
This quotation is also meant to be a direct dichotomy with a previous statement made: “There is likewise another great advantage in my scheme, that it will prevent those voluntary abortions, and that horrid practice of women murdering their bastard children” (Swift, 1729). Here, Swift has created a clever appeal to the social mores of the time: abortion was considered a heinous act, one that was socially and spiritually abhorrent; however, when followed to its logical conclusion, Swift’s argument for literally eating the children of underprivileged members of society-- the “other” society, perhaps-- made sense.
One of the most impactful lines written in A Modest Proposal is this one: “As to our city of Dublin, shambles may be appointed for this purpose in the most convenient parts of it, and butchers we may be assured will not be wanting; although I rather recommend buying the children alive, and dressing them hot from the knife, as we do roasting pigs” (Swift 1729). Without explicitly saying so, Swift is drawing a direct connection between the way the rich and elite treat the poor children of Dublin with swine, which are often considered the dirtiest and most base of the farm animals. It is a powerful image, and one of the few instances where Swift’s true voice and clear distaste for the elite of the culture comes through very strongly.
When considering the elderly, infirm, and maimed, Swift writes: “Some persons of a desponding spirit are in great concern about that vast number of poor people, who are aged, diseased, or maimedBut I am not in the least pain upon that matter, because it is very well known that they are every day dying and rotting by cold and famine, and filth and vermin, as fast as can be reasonably expected” (Swift, 1729). It was not enough to suggest that they are dying rapidly, but Swift uses the imagery of “rotting,” “filth,” and “vermin” to truly hammer at the sympathies of the reader, and encourage them to visualize and understand the terrible conditions that the poor of Ireland were experiencing on a daily basis.
Some analyses of Swift’s A Modest Proposal suggest that Swift is not only attacking the attitude of the English towards the Irish in this piece, but also the general social climate of the time. As previously stated, there was a large movement towards altruism as a social fad during the time Swift was writing A Modest Proposal; some of his social commentary could very well have been directed at the upper-class and their grand (and often ridiculous) schemes to solve social issues (Phiddian, 1996).
This theory is supported by the fact that Swift elucidates all of his points very carefully, complete with numbers and figures. This keeps with the style of the time, particularly with treatises that suggested a mathematical, scientific, or statistical approach to solving social problems (Phiddian, 1996). This scientific, callous, removed approach to the problem mimics the way in which the elite approached many of the social problems of the time.
The burgeoning Industrial Revolution brought science, industrialization, and mathematics to the forefront of everyone’s consciousness during the time when this particular treatise was written. Problems that had been previously considered unsolvable were suddenly being solved by mathematics, science, and industry; it is little wonder that people saw these advancements and wanted to try to apply the same principles to social and political issues.
In writing this piece, it is entirely possible that Swift’s purpose was multifaceted, and that his satire was directed at a variety of different people and issues that plagued the society. He was, after all, a master satirist and writer, and perfectly capable of attacking multiple problems at once. However, there is no question that his target readership was the elite of the society, and that one of his main purposes in writing A Modest Proposal was to utilize the “otherness” that the elite foisted upon the poor as an effective method for discussing the many social issues facing England and Ireland at the time.
References
Ferguson, O. W. (1962). Jonathan Swift and Ireland. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
Hunting, R. (1967). Jonathan Swift. New York: Twayne.
Landa, L. (1942). "A Modest Proposal" and Populousness. Modern Philology, 40 (2), pp.161-170.
Phiddian, R. (1996). Have You Eaten Yet? The Reader in A Modest Proposal. Studies in English Literature 1500-18000, 36 (3), pp.603-621.
Quintana, R., & Swift, J. (1965). The mind and art of Jonathan Swift. Gloucester, Mass: Peter Smith.
Swift, J. (1974). A short view of the state of Ireland. Dublin: Printed by S. Harding.
Swift, J. (1729). A modest proposal. Champaign, Ill: Project Gutenberg.
