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Summary of Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels:
Lemuel Gulliver, a surgeon on a merchant ship, relates his shipwreck on the Island of Lilliput, the inhabitants of which are six inches high. As a result of this diminutive scale, the pomp of the emperor, the civil feuds of the inhabitants, and the war with their neighbor across the borders or channels are made to look ridiculous. The English political parties and religious denominations are satirized in the description of the wearers of low and high heels as well as the controversy of whether eggs should be broken at the small or big end. Also, Gulliver is accidentally left ashore on Brobdingnag, where the inhabitants are very tall. The third part of Gulliver’s voyage is concerned with a visit to the flying Island of Laputa and its neighboring continent and capital, Lagado. The novelist at this point ridicules and questions through satire, scientists, philosophers as well as historians. The deception of history and the weakness or limitations of science are emphasized here with reference to the Royal Society and South Sea Company. The Struldbrugs, a race endowed with immortality, turns out to be the most miserable of mankind. Gulliver describes the country of the Houyhnhnms in the fourth part of his travels. The Houyhnhnms are horses endowed with reason, their simple, clean, rational, and cultured existence are compared or contrasted with the brutality and bestial nature of the sociable yahoos in human shape whose human vices Gulliver recognizes reluctantly. Most remarkable about his contact with the horses are his introduction to the uncommon virtue of the Houyhnhnm’s as well as their politics, economy, culture, custom, and their general happy life. He left for England, cultured, appreciates the realities of life, after the stages of experience with his hosts. The hero emerges more disciplined and more rational. He explains: “I have given thee a faithful history of my travels for sixteen years…. I could perhaps like others astonish thee with strange, improbable tales: but I rather choose to release plain matter of fact in the simplest manner and style, because my principal design was to inform and not to amuse thee” (p. 413).
3.5 Themes:
The thematic preoccupations of the English writer in Gulliver’s Travels are explained below.
3.5.1 The Irony of Life:
Jonathan Swift in his Gulliver’s Travels reveals the important theme of the irony of life. The central character in the novel travels away from home to gain more experience of and appreciate life and its realities. Rather than threaten the Lilliputians, Gulliver’s might and heights were subdued by the Lilliputian who tied his legs, hands, and hair and imprisoned him. His captives may not be more than six inches high but are industrious, “these people are most excellent mathematicians” (p.9). They also have “intelligent warriors and they have a great number of artisans, carpenters, builders, and engineers who are often put to work with immediacy and on the orders of the emperor, a respected patron of learning.” (p. 9)
The irony of this is that the short creatures even excelled more than the English in a number of areas.
3.5.2 Knowledge is Infinite:
Apart from the treatments to which the Lilliputians subjected Gulliver, life circumstances pushed him further on the voyage and he encountered the Houyhnhmns with different ideas of life, different beliefs and consciousness as well as sophistication. The hero learnt so much from the Houyhnhmns who taught him to imitate a more rational culture. The horses had to teach him their language and he marveled at their organizational ability.
3.5.3 Human/English Law as Corruption:
What Gulliver thought was a brilliant and convincing patriotism of his English nationality was replied by the judges and sages of the Houyhnhmns with sound and mind startling queries, doubts, and objections. He was asked the type of business the English normally spend the first and teachable part of their lives, and what method was used to cultivate the mind and bodies of their young nobility, as well as the qualifications of those appointed Lords in England. The Houyhnhmns reduce the humanity of the English law of the Augustan age to non-existence, claiming that what really exists is walking corruption, needless conflicts, and wars. Thus, England is not qualified nor has she any credential to present before other developing nations over which she assumes the role of an imperialist or missionary.
3.5.4 Rationality:
In the land of the Houyhnhmns, Swift proves there is a great deal of new knowledge that supersedes that of man. The chief Horse warns the lower Horses against the maltreatment of Horses, and this is contrary to what is in vogue in the human world, the England of the 18th century. The Horses are of the view that with patriotism and passion among Horses, the society will not need soldiers who will have to settle minor disputes in the field of battle.
3.5.5 Transformation:
The moral advantage of Gulliver’s travel impacts favorably on his life such that he emerged a more rational man. For instance, when Gulliver arrived home and his wife embraced him, he was reluctant to her embrace. He prefers the more humane and disciplined world of the Houyhnhmns who transformed him to a better Englishman. Swift’s hero recalls:
"I freely confess that all the little knowledge I have, of any value was acquired by the lecture I received from my master, and from hearing the discourses of him and his friends, to which I should be prouder to listen than to dictate to the greatest and wisest assembly in Europe. I admired the strength, comeliness, and speed of the inhabitants, and such a constellation of virtues in such amiable persons, produced in me the highest veneration" (p.243).
3.6 Style:
Below is a discussion of the style of the novelist in Gulliver’s Travels
3.6.1 Language:
The novel’s language combines satire and humor to reveal human follies. Gulliver’s subjectivity in the hand of the Lilliputians, though generates a fair amount of wisdom, is humorous. Likewise, the hero’s experiences with the Horses in the country of the Houyhnhnms. We observed a combination of the language of politics, history, philosophy, geography, military, and the law in the style of the novelist.
3.6.2 Allegorical Nature of the Novel:
Swift employs human characters in addition to non-human characters like the Horses, Lilliputians as well as Houyhnhnms to approach general human problems, particularly the English problems of his time from a practical point of view.
3.6.3 Travelogue:
Swift uses travelogue as a platform to review the state of England of the Augustan period. The hero’s travel covers sixteen years: “I have given thee a faithful history of my travels for sixteen years” (p. 143). Within the period of his travels, he learnt the nobility of the Lilliputian. He was also introduced to the social, economic, education, history, politics, philosophy, and general lifestyle of the inhabitants of Laputa, Houyhnhynms, and many others.
3.6.4 Mockery of the English:
The entire novel is an open mockery of the English social institutions, the laws especially, religion as well as economy and politics, military defense and intelligence considered to be the best anywhere in the world. But the Horses and Houyhnhnms literally pulled down the English legal and political structure and everything that defines her status and prestige with a deep probe of the manner in which the English make their laws, execute justice, and run the society generally. The creatures confronted Gulliver with a number of embarrassing questions like why a civilized English setting ignores the Court of Law to settle minor disputes in the field of battle as well as why England ignores religious and moral ethics to appoint Judges and give justice based on the educational qualifications or certificates of the man who gives justice. With these, the hero found himself and England naked and unprotected before his host.
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