Jonathan Swift
A Modest Proposal
For preventing the children of poor people in Ireland, from being a burden on their parents or country, and for making them beneficial to the publick
"A Modest Proposal" by Jonathan Swift is a satirical essay written and published in 1729. The work shockingly suggests that Ireland's poor could solve their economic troubles by selling their children as food to the wealthy. Through sustained irony and deadpan humor, Swift uses this outrageous premise to mock hostile attitudes toward the poor and expose the dehumanizing policies of British colonial rule. The essay remains celebrated for its dark wit and biting social commentary.