Figurative Language In The Third Book Of Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels

“And though I (…) understand

all mysteries and all knowledge

and have no charity, I am nothing.”

/St Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, 13, 2 /

Each of the four books of Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels discusses one aspect of human nature. The discussions’ language is rather satirical than an earnest tone. The first book is about the physical aspect, the voyage to Brobdingnag focuses on the “Homo politicus”, the political man. The third book is about intellect, while in the land if the Houyhnhnms we can “meet” the moral man. Now I am going to discuss the appearance of the intellectual aspect in the figurative language of book three.

The first and the most basic thing to make clear in connection with the Laputa part are the Enlightenment, which was the first clearly defined manifestation of modernity. Swift wrote in opposition to Enlightenment and as an “enemy” of modernity. Reading it now at the beginning if the 21st century we can see, that maybe of all these our age can be a catastrophic conclusion.

There are four points here I need to write about. Among these the first is Rationalism and Cartesianism. In connection with these tendencies we can notice a radical tendency to abstract truth into purely intellectual concepts. Rationalism can also be characterised by a bold rejection of the experience and wisdom of past.

The next tendency is experimental and theoretical science fathered by Bacon and Galileo, later vindicated by Newton and propagandised by the Royal Society in England. Here began the secularisation of society and human values. It proclaimed great promises to people such as seizing mastery of nature, abolition of all mysteries and (at least by implication) abolition of religion.

The third disc...

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...future. So their secret was not in their prophetic genius, but only in their widely open eyes in their own age. That is why their utopia is terribly exact, and that is why they could hit the target so precisely.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The list of works I used for collecting the most important discussion points

(Of mine or I ‘borrowed’ from the authors named below).

Holt Monk, Samuel. “The Pride of Lemuel Gulliver.” In: I. Robert A. Greenberg, ed. II. William Bowman Piper. The Writings of Jonathan Swift.,. W. W. Norton & Company, Inc, 1973.

Rawson, C. J. “Gulliver and the Gentle Reader.” In: I. Robert A. Greenberg, ed. II. William Bowman Piper. The Writings of Jonathan Swift., W. W. Norton & Company, Inc, 1973.

Williams, Kathleen. “The Fantasy World of Laputa.” In: ed., Richard Gravil. “Swift: Gulliver’s Travels. A Casebook.” The Macmillan Press, Hong Kong, 1994.