Monday, March 1, 2010
Guest Blogger - Nijhum D.
As I was reading 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 public, by Jonathan Swift, I was wondering how anyone could believe such a thing. He wants people to EAT babies, and skin them into clothes and shoes! What kind of crazy person would even say? I know this is a satire article but how does one even come up with that? Swift tries to sound intelligent by using economic reasoning and has a moral stance however it's utterly ridiculous. He wants to fatten up the children and feed to the rich land owners. The child is to be given away at the age of one, because he/she only drinks the mother's milk thus causing no expense or burden to the family. He is a nationalist and wants to help his country, by getting rid of overpopulation, and underemployment, and with the use of this article he points out a very immoral yet logical way to improve the overall well-being of the nation.
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One thing that someone and I were talking about was that people probably thought that his proposal was serious because it was mixed in with other proposals. That just makes it funnier that people would consider this as an option.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I'm just wondering, but did he put his real name on the article? Because there must have been people who were upset with his idea and people who took hims seriously, were probably disgusted by this idea.
I feel like some people did believe it because they may have been so desperate that any idea that seemed to work, was good enough. While that is really gross and to us seems wrong, desperate times call for desperate measures.
ReplyDeleteYet, i feel like when people did read the article they thought rationaly and were outraged, Swift gave the idea like it was no big deal at all.
Exactly Taylor, if I were him and my real name was in the article, i would feel the need to hide.
I think your right in saying that Swift went a little overboard on this satire, but I think he knew that. I think his point in doing this was to get his point across using low burlesque and with a more sarcastic tone.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the people that were reading this thought it was serious because no one would have eten their own child or even thought about selling it.
I think Swift was going so heavy on the eating babies part was to get people to really laugh. I mean, if he put too little in it, it wouldn't have been so ridiculous to the reader. It also wouldn't correctly show what Swift was satirizing, like the extreme realists in Ireland. I think the only way to make this satire work is to go completely overboard, since if he hadn't leaned on the concept enough, it just would have looked really stupid.
ReplyDeleteI suppose because of the heavy leaning on that creepy idea, some people probably too it a little too seriously. There will always be dumb people out there--they'll believe everything they read. Maybe Swift should have put it in a different place in the newspaper, or put in into a pamphlet rather than a newspaper at all.
Though his proposition was immensely inhumane, and would never actually occur, it is still being talked about today! Though it may be because of its ridiculous nature, this shows satirical work that was done very well. Like you said, the examples provided add a level of authority and logic, which relate it to every other proposition that was being offered at the time. Though it is very disturbing, Swift is a good example of a satirical author because he brought the realism of the time to the attention of the readers while poking fun at this outrageous idea.
ReplyDeleteThat's the thing I don't understand, did people actually believe him? The thought of someone suggesting that society should eat babies because of poverty & starvation disgusts me, but I guess that's why they call it satire. Good point Melanie, I guess he caught so much attention that we're still talking about him! He was so casual about it and acted like eating babies was no big deal, but I guess that's why his writing was classified as such good satire. I agree with Taylor & Sarah, I'd hide if my name was on such writing, but then again, it's viewed as good writing, and I don't really think Swift cared what other people thought.
ReplyDeleteNot just anyone can come up with such a disgusting solution to a problem, even if it wasn't meant to be enacted. But not just anyone can be as effective as Swift at shocking people and in turn changing their views as well. I know this article would catch me off guard if i was in Ireland at the time. I have great respect for Swift's twisted thought process because he utilized it to perfection.
ReplyDeleteI wish I could have seen the politicians faces as they read thier paper over thier breakfast. It would have been hilarious.
ReplyDeleteLike what Sarah said desperate times call for desperate measures. I wish that I could be in Swifts mentality as he thought out "A modest proposal". What do you think Swift was feeling while he wrote the article?
I don't think Swift wrote AMP in any seriousness whatsoever, it IS a satire so he wrote it with satirical intentions. The fact that it was published where other [serious] proposals were is probably where the part of people taking it seriously came from. Readers probably didn't realize right away that Swift was completely kidding around, and I'm sure Swift knew that. The way he writes it, with his statistics and whatnot, it SEEMS serious. I enjoyed AMP, even though it was a bit on the grotesque side.
ReplyDelete