’s Travels Essay, Research Paper
An Analysis of Gulliver’s Travels
When I first started reading the book I thought its only purpose was to talk
about the political system in England. But after some pages I found that there
could be a deeper message concealed, between the lines somewhere. The book is
divided into four minor novels. The first is about the Lilliputian’s the second
about Gulliver visits the giants, the third about the flying island and last
about Gullivers travels to the land of Houyhnhmland.
In the first book Gulliver gets shipwrecked and ends up on the island Lilliput
were some inhabitans of the island finds him and ties him to the ground. The
king hears of the news and sends the army to stop the giant from escaping.
Gulliver is then taken to the king’s castle were he is searched fore weapons or
other dangerous items. The Lilliputians are divided into two tribes. One is
holding Gulliver and the other lives on the second island which is separated
from the first by a canal (resembles of England and France) . Gulliver is at the
littlenders and the enemy is the bigenders which live on the island of Blefuscu.
Gulliver helps the Littlenders to defeat the bigenders. In this book Swift
emphasises the stupidity in the war between England and France and also every
war which starts over a stupid reason, he also points out the meaningless in
courtlife were they do nothing but waste the states money.
At he lilliputians he builds a raft which he uses to sail back to England. But
instead he finds himself shipwrecked and washed upon the shores of Brumbidang or
the giants land. there he was found by a farmer whom handed him over into his
daughters care. The farmer uses Gulliver for finical reasons and shows him up as
a side-showfreak at all the inns in the land. In the giants land there are no
classdeffirences this is something that probably Swift wanted to introduce to
the British system.
In this book Swift also attacks the British political and justice system with no
mercy, He also emphasises the meaningless of having an standing army in peace.
In the third book Gulliver gets picked up by men of the flying island of Laputa.
There everyone is striving to improve their environment in any way possible
everything from harvesting to building houses.
Gulliver visit the towns academy were he sees some scientists researching in
almost everything, inventing meaningless gadgets. In this third book Swift
expresses his opinions about the science which were achieving a much higher role
in society in those days, and he also wants us to strive backwards to the old
customs of life in the time of Aristoteles were science was not accepted by the
ordinary man.
In the fourth and finial book Gulliver meets the disgusting creatures called
yahoo’s. His first encounter almost cost him his life when the yahoo’s attacked
him. But the horses came to his rescue which scared them away. He is taken to
the horses home were he is feed. The right name for the horses is hoyhnhnm which
in their language means natures perfection, Gulliver uses the nature to feed him
self as making his own bread.
Later in the book he is questioned about his own society, here Swift’s uses the
horse as the worlds common sense while Gulliver represents the England. In this
book Swift also shoes what he thinks about the human race that were are not as
great and beautiful as we think but according to him lower then the animals.
There is a topic that runs through all the four novels, which is that the human
race often takes things for granted not considering that there could be some one
or something getting hurt, and also the injustice of the British law and
political system which existed in that time.