Restoration & NeoClassical Lit Blog

A brief read through of Jonathan Swift’s “ A Modest Proposal ” might leave you with the impression that Swift was a sick and twisted individual who enjoyed cannibalism and advocated for others to join in with him. Okay, so you can pick up your jaw from the ground and continue reading this blog post. Swift was no cannibal and he did not advocate for cannibalism. What he was arguing for were steps to prevent famine from continuing and overpopulation from occurring within Ireland. His method for argument, however, left some of his readers (including the Queen of England) to misinterpret his whole argument. Swift utilized irony and satire in his argument to the point that he confused people into believing that he was a cannibal. The proposal begins with Swift describing the fate of those children living in poverty. He describes how these children spend their time and limited energy searching for food. However, to rectify the issue at hand, at surface level it appears that Swif

Journalism – some people hate it and some people love it. While some people deem certain newspapers, tabloids, magazines, and newspapers to be “fake news”, some can’t wait to get their hands on a copy of the latest celebrity gossip.   The same could be said for those in the 18 th century. They found these news sources to be part of their daily life. Sir Richard Steele (1672 - 1729) Joseph Addison (1672 - 1719) During this time, Joseph Addison and Sir Richard Steele were the primary proponents of The Spectator , a daily gazette that ran from March 1711 to December 1712. According to the Norton Anthology, The Spectator included writings that focused on “… good manners, daily happenings in London, going to church, shopping, investing in the stock market, the fascinations of trade and commerce, proper gender roles and relations, the personality types found in society, the town’s offerings of high and low entertainment, tastes in literature and luxury goods, [and] philo