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Modest Proposal

Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal” can be used to prove the quote of Jules Feiffer stating that “satire is creating a logical argument which, followed to its end, is absurd.” The full title to Swift’s essay is “A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor People in Ireland from Being a Burden to their Parents or Country, and for Making them Beneficial to the Public.” This story takes place during a period of British oppression, when the Irish were seeking relief from poverty. His proposal is to fatten up 100,000 of the 120,000 undernourished children and to sell them to Ireland's rich land-owners at a year old. Doing this would battle overpopulation and unemployment, sparing families the expense of feeding and clothing a child while providing them with money from sale of their children, contributing to the overall economic welfare of the nation.
In “A Modest Proposal,” the main objective was to draw attention to the plight of the Irish peop...

Posted by: Tamara Moore

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