Dublin, Ireland during the eighteenth century was affected drastically by poverty. The streets were a home to many people, mostly mothers and their children. A lot of people saw this as a problem but not much was done in order to change it. People wrote about it but everything was being said over and over again so people did not pay much attention to it. It took a strange text called A Modest Proposal by a man named Johnathan Swift in order to draw the citizens of Dublins’ attention. Swift used an uncommon writing style for this time period called satire. By using this, he brought light to the problem. By using satire Swift is able to successfully show the readers how bad the poverty during this time period got under England law.

Johnathan Swift did a remarkable job at writing this proposal in a way that made it seem insane yet intelligent at the same time. By using satire he was able to get more attention by not only the citizens of Dublin, but also the Irish Parliament. “The Irish Parliament ignored numerous proposals which Swift made in earnest” (David Cody) But he continued to write about this issue. Swift chooses to remain anonymous when first releasing this passage because it is a very sensitive topic that he was covering. Also, by staying anonymous, readers could believe that this proposal was real. If they saw that a famous satirical writer was the author of this proposal, nobody would have taken it very seriously. Swift goes into depth on how he plans on following through with this plan because just proposing the idea doesn’t do enough. The key to making a successful satirical passage is to make it appear as if it is serious, especially during a time period when writing was the main way of communication. Swift starts off the passage with describing what the streets of Dublin look like, saying “It is a melancholy object to those.., when they see the streets, the roads and cabbin-doors crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags” (Swift). Swift does this to instill the image of kids all over the streets in the readers’ mind to help us imagine how dreadful it would be to walk around seeing homeless kids and mothers all over the place. This also supports his proposal because we start off with a negative image of poverty so he can easily transition into the proposal. Swift says “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” (Swift). The way that he is talking about how tasty children are makes it seem as if it is a good idea even though eating children is obviously morally wrong. No citizens are going to challenge this writers knowledge about this either because back in the 1700’s a poet was seen as very smart and educated so whatever Swift wrote was seen as factual information. That’s how you know that his writing is effective, Swift makes the reader believe that this unreal proposal could actually work which scares the readers because if an idea like that sounds like a strong possibility, then they need to create change before the government decides to do something similar to this idea.

Great Britain landed in Ireland in about 1169 and many years later they gained control of Ireland in 1603 after a war between The Catholics and the Protestants of Ireland. Great Britain passed the Declaratory Act of 1719 because they believed that Ireland was dependent of the crown. The Irish House was understandably infuriated by this because The British did not care for the Irish citizens. The Declaratory Act set off a lot of unfair laws that led to the increase in poverty. One of the major problems during this time was that only Catholics and people born in Ireland were being employed so the Protestants who came to Ireland were left to become beggars on the streets. Swift wrote this because at this time there was no social security system to bail people out so people were at the point in their lives where they would either need to resort to cannibalism or starve because begging on the streets did not brink enough money in to feed a family. 

Dublin went through a rough time while under the control of Great Britain. Some people may have read this and thought the writer was crazy for suggesting they should sell and eat children but for those who saw it as what it was, a satirical proposal, understood that poverty actually was a large problem. A Modern Proposal I think awakened a lot of Irish people and started the fight toward becoming more independent from Great Britain. Many laws were appealed after this happened so I would say this Proposal was effective in creating change during this time period. Would this text still be talked about if he decided to use a different writing style? The world may never know.
