Jonathan Swift and Irish Cannibals

After the reading this week I found Jonathan Swifts, A Modest Proposal very interesting. Even though his piece is satirising and he himself wouldn't ever take part in his proposal I still found it a very good read. It is different from our usual passages of information for HCJ with Rousseau and Hobbes. Just as I enjoyed Addison's, Royal Exchange I am finding that journalism in the very beginning was very interesting and different to how it is now.

Swift lived in Ireland whilst there were famines, very low money and many people on the streets begging for money to feed their children. His satirical piece proposes a way of getting more money for the country, beggars off of the streets and into housing that they can pay for, cheap food for the country and no more over-crowding in the towns and villages.

Swift takes a while to make his proposal, in my opinion he is leading the reader into a false sense of security. He hypes his proposal up saying that it will end all of their problems and Ireland will be better for everyone. The reader, wanting this will not expect what his proposal will be. It is almost setting the readers hopes up, telling them how it will work and how amazing his plan is and then he finally tells his proposal and "oh", it's eating babies. A fix maybe but not a fix anyone would want to do.

His proposal is to sell babies when they are a year old to be eaten. They can be, "stewed, roasted, baked or boiled". This would allow the beggar mothers to have money for selling their children. They would not have to buy food for their children, only allow them breast milk and then the child is off of their hands. Swift even comes up with an idea if the child is too scrawny to eat, they will simply, "make admirable gloves for ladies, and summer boots for fine gentlemen". His proposal is in the interest of both the higher classes and the lowest classes. The rich are giving money to the poor in order for their children. In Swifts eyes, it's a win-win situation for the people of Ireland and Ireland itself.

His proposal is very well thought out, he has come up with a number of how many babies, the amount of money they will be sold for, how to cook them, how to freeze them, which size is best, which age is best and how the mothers will feel. However he does also say that his knowledge has come from an American aquaintance. This would be the same as you or I receiving knowledge and using as a source a drunk man in a pub.

The end of his proposal is quite insightful to Jonathan Swift. He ends his proposal with, "I profess in the sincerity of my heart, that I have not the least personal interest in endeavoring to promote this necessary work, having no other motive than the public good of my country, by advancing our trade, providing for infants, relieving the poor, and giving some pleasure to the rich. I have no children by which I can propose to get a single penny; the youngest being nine years old, and my wife past child bearing." This may be that Swift wants people to know that he is not mad and that he does not condone eating peoples children. He is simply saying this could be one way of getting out of the struggle that Ireland is in. He also tries to show the reader that he has nothing to gain from his proposal just the good that it may bring as his children are no longer young enough and his wife too old to bear children.

If you would like to read this you can find it here -http://art-bin.com/art/omodest.html