a modest proposal背景知识.docVIP

Introduction .. .......Jonathan Swift wrote “A Modest Proposal” in 1720 to call attention to abuses inflicted on Irish Catholics by well-to-do English Protestants. Swift himself was a Protestant, but he was also a native of Ireland, having been born in Dublin of English parents. He believed England was exploiting Ireland. .......Many Irishmen worked farms owned by Englishmen who charged high rents–so high that the Irish were frequently unable to pay them. Consequently, many Irish farming families lived on the edge of starvation. .......In “A Modest Proposal,” Swift satirizes the English landlords with outrageous humor, proposing that Irish infants be sold as food at age one, when they are plump and healthy, to give the Irish a new source of income and the English a new food product to bolster their economy and eliminate a social problem. He says his proposal, if adopted, would also result in a reduction in the number of Catholics in Ireland, since most Irish infants–almost all of whom were baptized Catholic–would end up in stews and other dishes instead of growing up to go to Catholic churches. Here, he is satirizing the rivalry and prejudice characterizing Catholic-Protestant relations in Britain. .......Swift also satirizes the Irish themselves in his essay, for too many of them had accepted abuse stoically rather than taking action on their own behalf. .......The main literary device Swift uses in “A Modest Proposal is verbal irony–that is, he proposes the opposite of what he really believes. Historical Background .......Over the centuries, England gradually gained a foothold in Ireland. In 1541, the parliament in Dublin recognized England’s Henry VIII, a Protestant, as King of Ireland. In spite of repeated uprisings by Irish Catholics, English Protestants acquired more and more estates in Ireland. By 1703, they owned all but 10 percent of the land. Meanwhile, legislation was enacted that severely limited the rights of the Irish to hold government office,