Customer Reviews

A Modest Proposal and Other Satires (Literary Classics)

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Picture this. The next presidential candidate for the United States presidency asks welfare citizens to eat their children so they can escape poverty. Not only would the opponent win a landslide victory, the candidate would probably be hounded and hunted by the rich and poor alike. Now, imagine the engaging British author Johnathan Swfit penning the peice entitled " A Modest Proposal," where he asks parents in Ireland to eat their children for they are high in nutrition and by eating them, the parents will help hinder the threat of overpopulation. It appears to be gruesome and make a mockery of the Irish people, until we dig depper into the satirical peice to see that Swift was trying to convey the starvation and oppresion of the Irish people by writing the peice in an English publication as well as a time when you were either for England or for Ireland, but never both. Swift's humorous outlook is really an expression of disgust to the circumstances that surrounded the Irish under a harsh tolatarian English rule. He succesfully engages the reader through humor as well as a fascinating argument where he encourages the reader to agree with his argument. I enjoyed " A Modest Proposal" because it had elements that other satries on the same subject lacked, humor. Swift is succesful at what he does because he does not tell the readers outright the conditions of the Irish people, but he weaves it skillfully into the essay, creating a fascinating, funny, and sharp essay.

Famous now only for "Gulliver's Travels," Swift proves more cogently in his other satires that he is the English master of irony. For example, there is nothing remotely modest about what he proposes in "A Modest Proposal," which is that Irish people who are starving because of English economic policies should remedy their situation by eating their own children, boasting the added benefit of reducing the number of "papists." Like an eighteenth-century George Carlin, Swift is funny just for the blatant outrageousness of his words, but there is also a truthful undercurrent in much of what he says.

Swift, hereditarily an Englishman born in Dublin who became an Anglican minister and who was eventually sent back to Dublin--"exiled" as he called it--for the remainder of his life, made himself a mouthpiece for the Irish people and a gadfly to any authorities who he felt overstepped their bounds. In his "Drapier" letters, he warns the Irish not to take any wooden nickels; that is, to reject the base-metal currency being foisted upon them by the English in order to scuttle their economy. In his poem on "The Legion Club" he hurls hilarious verbal salvos at members of the Irish Parliament who are selling out to the English, caricaturing them as monsters and demons.

"A Tale of a Tub" goes everywhere, but the main narrative thread is an allegory of the Reformation. Three brothers, Peter, Martin, and Jack, inherit a fortune from their father and proceed to conquer the world, but entrapment by the vices (personified as women) incites them to squabble and results in a schism in which Martin (Luther) and Jack (John Calvin) leave Peter (the Roman church) for their own haunts. Interspersed throughout this tale are playful swipes at literary critics and pedants, including a fantasy on the professional windbags known as the Aeolists. Harold Bloom has called "A Tale of a Tub" the best prose work in the English language, and furthermore has said that he reads it on a regular basis to punish himself, which I think speaks volumes even if you don't value Bloom's opinion.

Religion is naturally one of Swift's concerns. He generally likes it, but he has the sensibility to say, "We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another." He advocates religious sobriety; in the "Mechanical Operation of the Spirit" he ridicules fanatics who claim to be able to communicate with God. His "Argument Against Abolishing Christianity" offers solid rationale for preserving the institution, one reason being that the criticism of it is the only forum which allows certain writers to exercise their rhetorical talents.

This edition also contains a short list of Swift's epigrams, at least one of which has achieved some notoriety: "When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him." Mostly these are observations of human nature and its folly, and while not all may resonate, some are surprisingly timeless: "It is a miserable thing to live in suspense; it is the life of a spider." Remember that the next time you decide to buy a lottery ticket.

This book is very interesting and you will not be able to put it down. It is a satire, but may take some time to see the humor in it after you start to read it. This book was written about 200 years ago in Ireland and is a view by the author on what should be done about homelessness. Swift's views are shocking and gruesome, yet gripping. The premise of his view appears to be very cruel, yet after thinking about what he says, you realize it is a mockery and is meant to be humorous, while still proving a point. His point is important and opens your eyes to the world and homelessness. I recommend this book to anyone interested in satirical works as it is probably the best one that I have ever read.

Economic advisors to governments ought to be tied down and made to read Swift's A Modest Proposal, along with Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations. The irascible Dean of Dublin's St Pat's had enough spleen in him for ten generations. His blackly intelligent satire is as sharp today as the day it was first published.

I Personally think that the modest porposal is feasible. I think that If you read the story you will be able to understand all of it. There is no way out of what he has sugessted. HE is a very smart man and if you had no thoughts and or emotions you would be able to say the same if you were just given the poposal rather than read the book. Although he is feasible, or should I say his thoughts, what he has said will and never will work to solve the problem. in order to do so there needs to be some kind of agreement that states " I put all of my feelings aside and contmeplate with what the eral problem is. Nothing will ever be accomplished unless this is done.

Joseph Froehle