Sunday, August 30, 2009

10A Homework: Answer to #4 of 'A Modest Proposal's comprehension questions

In the comments section of this post, I have placed the answer to question 4. Please put this in your notes.

1 comment:

Miss Jones said...

4. What sort of persona does Swift create for the "author" of A Modest Proposal? (In other words, what kind of writer and what kind of genre is this satire imitating and mocking?)

The "proposer" is notable for his vanity, his cold-heartedness, and the ruthlessness of his logic. He represents the hypocrisy and superficiality of many would-be reformers, whose seeming benevolence masks such impediments as prejudice, intolerance, sentimentalism, and hyper-abstraction. He reduces the suffering of the poor to numbers and statistics, and it is this coldness that makes him such an unappealing author. You would most likely find this article in a pamphlet or magazine that was about social reform.