Analysis Of Gulliver's Travels

Using the popular style of a travelogue, Jonathan Swift, through the point of view of Gulliver, an English seamen, satirizes human nature and English society in Gulliver’s Travels. As a result of a series of unfortunate events, Gulliver is taken on four voyages to curious lands that defy the laws of nature. The uniqueness of each land provides not only a captivating tale, but a metaphor that highlights Swift’s satire. Swift exemplifies the use of these metaphors through the parallels of Gulliver’s first voyage to Lilliput, a land of people no more than six inches tall (Swift 17), and his second voyage to Brobdingnag, a land inhabited by sixty-foot giants (Swift 79). In these first two voyages, Swift uses the size of the human creatures Gulliver

By reducing the size of the Lilliputians, who metaphorically represents English society, Swift strips them of any real significance and power. Instead, their pride and self-importance makes them believe in a false power. This point is exemplified through Gulliver’s account of how the Lilliputians achieve rank and authority. According to Gulliver,

“When a great Office is vacant, either by Death or Disgrace, (which often happens) five or six of those Candidates petition the Emperor to entertain his Majesty and the Court with a Dance on the Rope; and whoever jumps the highest without falling succeeds in the Office (Swift

Unlike the country of Lilliput, the institutions by which the lives of the people of Brobdingnag are governed by is not built on vice. On the island of Brobdingnag, Gulliver is to the giants what the Lilliputians were to Gulliver. This is a metaphor in which the giants are large in order to represent the compassion of humankind and to highlight the faults of Gulliver, who represents English society. For example, Gulliver wells up with pride when he is asked to describe European society to Brognignag’s King, confessing to the reader that he “wished for the tongue of Demosthenes or Cicero, that might have enabled me to celebrate the Praise of my own dear native Country in a Style equal to its Merits and Felicity (Swift 116).” However, after telling the King all about his native land, the King is amazed at the corruption that plagues European society. According to the