A Modest Proposal

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Swifts treatise lives up to its reputation, hilarious and somewhat offensive. His serious delivery of the prescription of eating Irish children still shocks and amuses, especially in its self-conscious spearing of prescriptive theorists. Change the name of the country and alter the situation a bit and the satire could be a contemporary work, if only we still had talented satirists. It was fun to finally read the essay in its entirety. I recommend it to anyone who enjoys jokes about eating people or who enjoy satire.

I do believe that if Jonathan Swift were alive today, he would be writing for The Onion. Which, coming from me, is highest praise.

My favorite short story. The font in this little book makes it challenging to read.

Classic satire. Probably not recognized as such today

Insightful, witty, and clever. Being a new parent and wholly deprived of sleep, I must admit he makes some excellent points...

When viewed from the stand point of the author the endeavor is placed as his only option for what he sees as over population and poverty. Removing all emotional humanity from his writing and instead using only logic he misses the most important parts. First that not eating one another is in fact part of our humanity and secondly people taste just awful.

Short and to the point, this is political satire at its best. While some background of Irish history is helpful, what I most like about Mr. Swifts arguments is that they can apply to any society where the group in power frets over what to do with the poor. I was in the middle of a book on the history of the Civil Rights movement in the American South when I read this, and what struck me was how Swifts satire lined up with the events a continent and centuries away from the original subject.

Johnathan Swift crafts a brilliant satire about serious issues of his day such as the widening wealth gap, growing poverty, lack of altruistic empathy, which are even more relevant today than they were in the authors time. A must read for the modern person.

“But, as to my self, having been wearied out for many years with offering vain, idle, visionary thoughts, and at length utterly despairing of success, I fortunately fell upon this proposal….” Clever, brilliant and humorous satire and treatise here from Jonathan Swift that takes many a shot at several different aspects of how society handled the problems of poverty and starvation in Ireland as well as the rich among other areas. I find it amazing how Swift could take irony to a new level and for such an extended length of time in his essay, not only poking holes at aspects of society, but carrying it through. He begins his essay by setting up the problems and crisis of poverty in such a deadpan manner that the “solution” is such a shock (and quite funny). He argues so…well…swiftly and effectively, and elaborates quite thoroughly for his “plan” that I think, dear reader, you just might be convinced as well. There are some definite laugh out loud moments from Swift’s essay. Here are a few gems below: “they shall, on the contrary, contribute to the feeding, and partly to the clothing on many thousand…” “I grant this food will be somewhat dear and therefore very proper for landlords, as they have already devoured most of the parents…” “…so much wasted among us by the great destruction of pigs, too frequent at our table; which are in no way comparable in taste of magnificence to a well grown, fat yearly child, which roasted whole will make a considerable figure at a Lord Mayor’s feast.” And Swift says all this with a straight face. This one is so good you’ll be eating it up.