Many compromises were used in American History to help control the nation. In Jonathon Swift’s piece of writing, A Modest Proposal, he proposes a compromise in order to solve the problem of poverty in Ireland. The narrator suggests poor families should sell their children because they are not rich enough to take care of them. The sold children are then made into food for the higher class to eat. The proposal assumes this will both help the poor and provide food for the rich. Obviously, this proposal is just a joke about how bad the poor are treated, and should not be taken seriously because no sane person thinks eating children is good. Three of the most ironic jokes which were presented are the reasoning behind how eating teenagers is bad, how he thinks the proposal will encourage marriage, and why he will not be involved in the proposal.
When somebody else suggests they should sell and eat teenagers too, the narrator disagrees, and his explanation tops the roof for irony. At first glance, one might expect he decided not to eat teenagers because they are already full grown. In just a few years, they will become adults, so why would one want to kill someone just before their life has truly started. Additionally, killing teenagers is also more painful because they are more aware than babies. Instead of providing the “logical” (Nothing is logical in this proposal) reasoning, the narrator says teenagers should not be eaten because they do not taste good. Not because it is ruining their futures, but because they don’t taste good. This unexpected twist is truly ironic.
The second ironic jokes is when the narrator suggests this proposal promotes marriage. Marriage is something which is done when two individuals love each other. Marriage is an achievement in life, and it shows how one is ready to have children and start raising a family. For many people, marriage is a ways to show the bond of love between a family. In the proposal, the narrator suggests the proposal induces marriage because they will treat their children better. In the world of this nonsense proposal, treating their children better translates to feeding their children more so they can taste better when eaten. Feeding one’s children to other people, that doesn’t sound like love.In the proposal, another reason why the narrator thinks marriage is promoted is because it allows them to sell their babies for money to get rich. Karen Salmansohn, a best-selling book author once said, “When you learn how much you’re worth, you’ll stop giving people discounts.” Life is not something to buy and sell, as it is worth infinite money. Nothing can buy it, and as Karen says, one won’t even dare to give a discount. Irony is shown in every part of this joke.
The last joke is how the writer of the proposal says will not be involved in the proposal. He explains that, “I have no children, by which I can propose to get a single penny; the youngest being nine years old, and my wife past childbearing.” His words are basically an excuse that he can not sell his own children anymore. In his proposal, he even writes how it is the best solution ever seen by mankind, and how no counter-argument could possibly poke out some flaws. If a proposal is so “good”, the only possible reason he says this excuse is because he thinks the ideas presented in his proposal are cruel, and he self-contradicts himself. This is ironic because an author with such a strong direct tone towards his claim throughout the entire essay just provides an unresolved counter-argument.
In conclusion, there were many ironic jokes highlighted in A Modest Proposal. His first joke was when he thought eating teenagers is bad because they don’t taste good. His second joke explained that the proposal will promote marriage because the family will want to sell their babies for money. The third and final jokes is when the writer self-contradicts himself without and provides no rebuttal. Ironic jokes are used in literature in many ways, and Jonathon Swift used irony to show that the proposal was just a joke.