Rebellion and Conformity in the Rhetoric of Swift and King
Introduction to the texts
Authorial 'position'
Outsiders
Leaders/literary stylists
Authorial Intent
Satire
Polemic
Authorial Style
Similarities and differences in use of indirect address
Intentions
Concluding Similarities
Jonathan Swift's 1729 "A Modest Proposal" and Martin Luther King's 1963 "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" are both works written in protest by authors who were social critics of the contemporary mores of their society. Swift used satire to condemn the callousness exhibited by English society towards the Irish and Irish children. Martin Luther King used direct and forceful polemical prose to attack the conformist ministers of the state of Birmingham where King had come to engage in acts of civil disobedience, in the name of advancing the larger cause of civil rights in America.
Both King and Swift wrote as outsiders to their respective societies. Swift took a negative view, personally and politically,...
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