A Modest Proposal

Shock Tactics in Swift 's A Modest Proposal

In A Modest Proposal ' Jonathan Swift sets about as if he were proposing a reasonable political solution to the severe economic and social issues facing Ireland . According to his words near the end of his essay , Swift has been wearied out for many years with offering vain , idle , visionary thoughts , and at length [he is] utterly despairing of success (Swift 346 ) Rather than continue to propose the sort of progressive ideas he so thus dismisses , Swift hits upon an extremely brutal solution to the

economic crisis : the Irish should convert their one-year-old infants into dinner stock . A young healthy child , well nursed , is , at a year old , a most delicious , nourishing , and wholesome food , whether stewed , roasted , baked , or boiled (342 ) This shocking proposal is surely designed to revolt Swift 's readers . By creating this initial sense of horror , Swift is able to transfer the reader 's distaste for cannibalism onto the common political arguments he imitates in defense of his proposal

Obviously , Swift cannot seriously want to see infants devoured in place of suckling pigs however , by proposing this as a humane alternative to the horrific conditions of the Irish underclass , he forces the reader to acknowledge that taking no positive action in this regard is the moral equivalent of such murder . For this reason he concludes his argument by claiming that most beggars , farmers , and laborers would think it a great happiness to have been sold for food at a...