The Need To Shock

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Literature > Comparative Literature

The Need To Shock

A comparative analysis of the use of satire and sustained irony in "Of Cannibals" by Michel de Montaigne and in "A Modest Proposal" by Jonathon Swift.

1,341 words () | 4 sources | MLA | 2005 Canada

Paper Summary:

The use of satire or sustained irony is a rhetorical strategy which an essayist may use to disconcert a blase reader into questioning areas which seem to reveal a certain degree of folly or stupidity. This paper discusses how, whether intended for a scholar such as "Of Cannibals" by Montaigne or intended for the general populace as in "A Modest Proposal" by Jonathon Swift, caustic wit becomes the means to critique society to a more receptive and entertained audience. It looks at how Swift and Montaigne choose their rhetorical strategy for the impact it would have on the reader in the hope of gaining interest in the cause or ideology they believed in.

From the Paper:

"Ireland was poverty stricken due to a massive famine and oppressive taxation by the British in Jonathon Swift's era. "A Modest Proposal" was intended to provoke concern over the quandary of the poor. The state of affairs in Ireland was unsound due to the lower classes continuing to yield large families in the midst of a famine with little work to be had and the upper classes who were indifferent in regards to the welfare of the poor populace. Swift chose to adopt the personae of someone writing a "serious letter" to address the situation and offers the idea of finding "a fair, cheap and easy method of making" (Swift 217) the "children sound, useful members of the commonwealth". (Swift 217) This method involves offering the children for sale as food for the nobles."