A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift

A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift is quite an entertaining read! You may have read it or heard about it in school as one of the most famous examples of satire. I read it in high school but recently saw it on Project Gutenberg and gave it another read thru. It’s more of an essay than a book and is well worth a short reading session!

Book Stats

• Title: A Modest Proposal For preventing the children of poor people in Ireland, from being a burden on their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the publick
• Author: Jonathan Swift
• Genre: Satire, Classics, Politics
• Publication Date: 1729
• Est. Reading Time: 30 mins.
• My Rating: 4/5 Stars
• Buy Now: Amazon or Read for free online!

A Modest Proposal: Concept

Swift begins the essay with a straightforward and rather innocuous description of the problems Ireland faces from the poor and promises a solution. He appears very reasonable and then hits you with the suggestion that the poor sell their babies to the rich as food.

“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 fricasee, or a ragoust.”

– Jonathan Swift, A Modest Proposal

Swift then continues to provide a number of arguments in favor of the proposal that actually make it sound like a decent idea…if you can ignore the fact that he’s talking about eating human babies.

A Modest Proposal: Objections

Once you’ve been “convinced” of Swift’s proposal, he talks of objections and a number of other potential solutions that couldn’t possibly work. In comparison to his extreme plan of eating babies, these other solutions appear to be workable options but I’m sure they were opposed by many people at the time. In fact, many of the suggestions would still be difficult to implement today, such as raising taxes or reducing imports.

“I can think of no one objection, that will possibly be raised against this proposal, unless it should be urged, that the number of people will be thereby much lessened in the kingdom. This I freely own, and was indeed one principal design in offering it to the world. I desire the reader will observe, that I calculate my remedy for this one individual Kingdom of Ireland, and for no other that ever was, is, or, I think, ever can be upon Earth. Therefore let no man talk to me of other expedients: Of taxing our absentees at five shillings a pound: Of using neither clothes, nor houshold furniture, except what is of our own growth and manufacture: Of utterly rejecting the materials and instruments that promote foreign luxury: Of curing the expensiveness of pride, vanity, idleness, and gaming in our women: Of introducing a vein of parsimony, prudence and temperance: Of learning to love our country…
Therefore I repeat, let no man talk to me of these and the like expedients, till he hath at least some glympse of hope, that there will ever be some hearty and sincere attempt to put them into practice.”

– Jonathan Swift, A Modest Proposal

This is a great example of a rhetorical device known as apophasis or paralipsis, where Swift presents his true suggestions by denying they should be suggested. This is a very interesting tactic to me because in comparison to the baby eating proposal you’re likely to accept these options, but when presented alone, things like higher taxes are often rejected.

A Modest Proposal: Final Thoughts

Although written almost 300 years ago, Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal is a very interesting, short read that’s still applicable to politics today. Hopefully we’re better than 1700’s Ireland, but there is still poverty today and disagreement over how to address it.

Did you know what A Modest Proposal was about before reading it or were you shocked by Swift’s suggestion?