Sign Up Now
Get instant access to over 1 million+ study documents
OR
Already registered? click here to login
By creating your account, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and student honor code.
Jonathan Swift's "A Modest proposal" is a satirical work that draws the reader in, defining and describing a social problem of poor families with children they are unable to feed. The surprise is not revealed at the end, but part the way through the work, where the suggestion of cannibalism is made. Swift suggests that a solution which will help alleviate poverty and the strain placed on families to feed growing children and to create a scenario in which poor children can become economically beneficial (Swift, 1729). The idea was to sell children at the age of one year, to provide food for the wealthy. The age of one year was chosen as the cost of feeding a child in the first twelve months was estimated at being very low, and Swift also states he was assured that at the age of one year a child would be "most delicious nourishing and wholesome food" (Swift, 1729).
The suggestion is a shock; the problem addressed is very real, it is true that there were many people living in poverty who have a large number of children. The introduction...
The cost of raising the child is considered, and the time taken until they will be able to create an economic return is used to show that children are uneconomic. During their first year of life it is argued their cost is low, and as such they may be supported during that period (Swift, 1729). Indeed, the more they feed and the fatter they get, the greater the potential benefit if they are used for food, indicating that they will provide more meat (Swift, 1729). The use of babies in this way will ensure that they are creating economic value, their bodies will fetch a price, and there will not be the need to feed the children used in this way. Swift argues that the cost of raising the child would be approximately 2 shillings, including rags, but that 10 shillings may be gained for a good carcass (Swift, 1729). It is even suggested that the skin may be used for gloves or boots, which would increase the value of the…
References
Diehl, Nicholas, (2012), Satire, Analogy, and Moral Philosophy, The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 71(4), 311-321
Swift, J, (1729), 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, accessed at http://www.victorianweb.org/previctorian/swift/modest.html
Journal Writing "a Modest Proposal" by Jonathan Swift As the name suggests, this is a proposal put forth by the writer on the way to help Ireland out of the problem of beggars along the streets and an ever increasing population of poor people within the nation. Indeed, he not only views his suggestions as viable towards decreasing the population of the poor, but to also earn the country foreign money that
WESLEY J. SMITH'S TRUTH ABOUT ASSISTANCE" Wesley J. Smith's analysis of euthanasia and assisted suicide is logically flawed in several ways. First, rather than discussing the main arguments supporting the idea in principle, Smith attacks the most extreme scenarios imaginable, and presents unethical and completely unconscionable applications of assisted suicide to which even its staunchest proponents object as strongly as do those opposed to it. Likewise, his concern that the concept of
Joyce's Ulysses Claude Rawson is best known as a scholar of Jonathan Swift and the eighteenth century, but Rawson's has also used the savage irony of Swift's modest proposal for a series of essays which consider Swift's invocation of cannibalism in light of a longer tradition (in Anglo-Irish relations) of imputing cannibalism literally to the native Irish as a way of demonizing their "savagery" or else to implying a metaphorical cannibalism
Nonexistent Knight is a character driven narrative and, therefore, should be summarized within the framework of those characters and their exploits throughout the novella. The titular character, the nonexistent knight, Agilulf, who exists not in the flesh but in a suit of armor, seeks to restore his honor by confirming that his good deed that earned him his knighthood, saving the virginity of a young royal woman from the
While on one hand, the Nile gets the highest discharge from rainfall on the highlands of Ethiopia and upland plateau of East Africa, located well outside the Middle East region; on the other hand, discharge points of the other two rivers, Euphrates and Tigris, are positioned well within the Middle East region, prevailing mostly in Turkey, Syria along with Iraq. In other areas, recurrent river systems are restricted to