Question:
The following lines capture the central trope of a well-known 18th century satirical tract.
``I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child, well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food...''
Identify the tract from the options below.
The following lines capture the central trope of a well-known 18th century satirical tract.
``I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child, well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food...''
Identify the tract from the options below.
``I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child, well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food...''
Identify the tract from the options below.
Show Hint
Satirical works often use exaggeration and irony to expose social evils; recognizing tone is key to identifying such texts.
Updated On: Dec 20, 2025
- John Stuart Mill, ``On Liberty''
- Francis Bacon, ``On Death''
- Jonathan Swift, ``A Modest Proposal''
- Robert Graves, ``Warning to Children''
Show Solution
Verified By Collegedunia
The Correct Option is C
Solution and Explanation
Step 1: Understanding the passage.
The quoted lines shockingly suggest the consumption of children as food, which immediately signals the use of extreme irony and satire rather than a literal proposal.
Step 2: Identifying the genre and period.
The text is described as an 18th century satirical tract. Among the options, Jonathan Swift is a major satirist of this period, known for using exaggerated logic to critique social and political problems.
Step 3: Matching content with the work.
In ``A Modest Proposal'', Swift sarcastically proposes that impoverished Irish children be sold as food to the wealthy, aiming to criticize British exploitation and indifference to Irish suffering. The quoted lines are taken directly from this work.
Step 4: Eliminating other options.
John Stuart Mill and Francis Bacon wrote philosophical essays, not satirical tracts of this nature, while Robert Graves is a 20th century poet.
Final Answer: (C) Jonathan Swift, ``A Modest Proposal''
The quoted lines shockingly suggest the consumption of children as food, which immediately signals the use of extreme irony and satire rather than a literal proposal.
Step 2: Identifying the genre and period.
The text is described as an 18th century satirical tract. Among the options, Jonathan Swift is a major satirist of this period, known for using exaggerated logic to critique social and political problems.
Step 3: Matching content with the work.
In ``A Modest Proposal'', Swift sarcastically proposes that impoverished Irish children be sold as food to the wealthy, aiming to criticize British exploitation and indifference to Irish suffering. The quoted lines are taken directly from this work.
Step 4: Eliminating other options.
John Stuart Mill and Francis Bacon wrote philosophical essays, not satirical tracts of this nature, while Robert Graves is a 20th century poet.
Final Answer: (C) Jonathan Swift, ``A Modest Proposal''
Was this answer helpful?
0
0
Top GATE XH-C2 English Literature Questions
- Who published the novel The Bell Jar under the pseudonym Victoria Lucas?
- In which collection did Walt Whitman's poem "Song of Myself" first appear?
- Who wrote the introduction to Rabindranath Tagore's Gitanjali?
- Identify the title of the poem in which the following lines appear:
"He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint
For in everything he did he served the greater community." - Identify the point of view used in the following passage: "You are not the kind of guy who would be at a place like this at this time of the morning. But here you are, and you cannot say that the terrain is entirely unfamiliar, though the details are fuzzy."
View More Questions
Top GATE XH-C2 Language and Literature Questions
- Which of the following is the forerunner of the autobiography?
- The 'Age of Reason' in English literary history is popularly known as:
- “This literary mode parallels the flouting of authority and inversion of social hierarchies that, in many cultures, are permitted in a season of … . It does so by introducing a mingling of voices from diverse social levels that are free to mock and subvert authority, to flout social norms by ribaldry, and to exhibit various ways of profaning what is ordinarily regarded as sacrosanct.” The above description explains the concept of ________ .
- “Postcolonial perspectives emerge from the colonial testimony of Third World countries and the discourses of ‘minorities’ within the geopolitical divisions of East and West, North and South. They intervene in those ideological discourses of modernity that attempt to give a hegemonic ‘normality’ to the uneven development and the differential, often disadvantaged, histories of nations, races, communities, people.” The above commentary on the postcolonial perspective has been extracted from which of the following?
- Which of the following author(s) has/have won the Booker Prize twice?
View More Questions
Top GATE XH-C2 Questions
- "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" is a/an____.
- Match the following pairs of fictional characters with the author who created them:
a Phileas Fogg and Jean Passepartout i William Shakespeare b Don Quixote and Sancho Panza ii Jules Verne c Candide and Pangloss iii Miguel de Cervantes d Dogberry and Verges iv Voltaire - Which one of the following is a famous detective character created by Edgar Allan Poe?
- "The horror! The horror!" - these are the last words of_____.
- Eric Arthur Blair was born in Motihari, Bihar. He went on to become famous as an author of a dystopian work which introduced the terms 'Newspeak', 'Thoughtcrime', and 'Doublespeak'. He wrote under the pseudonym______.
View More Questions