Gulliver's Travels

1289 Words3 Pages

As a seemingly wise and educated man, throughout the novel Gulliver's Tarvels, the narrator cleverly gains the reader's respect as a thinking and observant individual. With this position in mind, the comments and ideas that Gulliver inflicts upon those reading about his journeys certainly have their own identity as they coincide with his beliefs and statements on the state of humanity and civilization in particular. Everywhere Gulliver goes, he seems to comment on the good and bad points of the people he encounters. Sometimes, he finds a civilization that he can find virtues within, but he also encounters peoples and places which truly diusgust him in their manner of operation and civility. Overall, Swift gives Gulliver a generally negative and cynical attitude towards the manner in which his current day English counterparts behaved cleverly disguised in the subtext of his encounters with other nations that either contrasted the way they lived, or mirrored unflatteringly his contemporaries lifestyles.

In Gulliver's first voyage to Lilliput, his role as the town giant not only put into perspective the selfishness and unrelenting need for power of the human race, but also opened his eyes to the untrusting and ungrateful nature of those aforementioned. When he first arrived in their land, the Lilliputians opted to tie him up, giving him no freedom, which he luckily did not object to. Then, once they had developed a somewhat symbiotic realationship with him, Gulliver was basically forced to abide to their whims and fancies, and ultimately to be their tool in war. At any time, Gulliver could have escaped their grasp, but instead, he opted to stay and observe and oblige to their customs. He was a very agreeable guest. He did tricks for them, he saved their princess from her burning castle, he defeated their mortal enemies, and all he was rewarded with was their spite and mistrust. From the start, no matter how cordial and well-behaved he was, there was little trust bestopwed upon him by the people that bound him to their home. Also, Gulliver explains the rediculous manner in which one becomes accredited in their society. "For as to that infamous practice of acquiring great Employment by dancing on the Ropes, or Badges of Favor and Distinction by leaping over sticks, and creeping under them; the reader is to observe, that they were first introduced by the Grand father or the Emperor now reigning; and grew to the present Height, by the gradual increase of Party and Faction.

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