Figurative Language In A Modest Proposal

Jonathan Swift was an Anglo-Irish satirist and essayist who lived from 1667-1745. Born in Dublin, he was part of the privileged social class in Ireland. Ireland was at the time ruled by England. The Stuarts had established a Protestant governing aristocracy amid the country's relatively poor Catholic population. Swift would shuffle back and forth between positions in England and Ireland. In doing this, he became increasingly embroiled in English politics. England’s policies towards Ireland were often cruel and irrational (SparkNotes). The poor people of Ireland were struggling to survive. Although he was a member of the elite class, and very involved in English life, Swift remained sympathetic to the Irish people. He reacted to the debilitating …show more content…
In this way, Swift is speaking out through the speaker. The speaker is talking about how valuable this food will be, and to whom it should go to, and says, “I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore vey proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children” (1201). This sentence plays on the overall metaphor of the essay that, “The English are devouring the Irish” (1199). The English were figuratively devouring the Irish through absentee landlords (SparkNotes). These landlords were often wealthy Protestants living in England who rented land to Irish Catholics. The problem with this system is that landlords were often unfair and much of the wealth from the land was exported out of Ireland to England. This is one of the reasons the Great Irish Famine was so detrimental to the poor people of Ireland (SparkNotes). These landlords had complete control over many of these poor Irish, while Parliament did nothing about it. In the essay, the English are literally devouring the Irish by consuming the infants of poor Irish families. Swift uses this harsh metaphor to emphasize the severity of this