Gulliver's Travels, The man and the writer

Gulliver's Travels

1^MEETING: When Gulliver arrives in the new land he walks inside it and

sees tracks of human feet of cows and of horses, then he sees some strange

animals: they look like monkeys infact they climb high trees, they have haizy

bodies and strong clows, they are nimble. They females are smaller and don't have any hair on their faces but only some soft hair on the rest of the body.

Their hair are of different strange colours: yellow, brown, red and black.

Gulliver feels antipathy against them. Then Gulliver goes on, on that road

and sees in front of him one of this creatures. He blows him with his hanger

but a large group of other monster run against him and he tries to defend

himself with the hanger.

2^MEETING: Gulliver meets two horses, the encounter is very interesting

pacific infact the horses touch and study him so that Gulliver thinks that

they are so intelligent, because they are magican metamorphosed in horsed.

Just to teose a stranger like him or that they are really surprised by his stran-

ge clothes. He asks one of them to take him upon his back to some house or

village, and in return he offers them a knife and a bracialet. In the end Gulli-

ver tries to understand the language of the two horses and to pronunce some

word: yahoo and houyhnhnn and so now there is a great feeling beetween

The man and the writer

Jonathan Swift studied in Trinity college in Dublin. In 1689 he left Ireland

because of civil war and moved to England. He worked for sir W.Temple, a

diplomat of wide colture. Here he had the opportunity to meet many political

personality and to use  the library to develop his literary talent. He stayed

with sir Temple till his death, working in support of the Whigh party. In 1704

he pubblished "A tale of a tube", a satire on religious superstition and fana-

ticism. He was Irish but he always consider himself Englishman. In 1724 he

pubblished the "Drapier's letters" where he criticised English misgovernment

of Ireland. In 1726 Swift pubblished "Gulliver's travels". This work reflect

the values of his age. Infact in this period there reality: was a rational appro-

ach to nature. His satire is not only the expression of his personal pessimism

but it shows also the dehumanaising effects of the absence of rationality in

human nature. The story had the porpose to seem a real travel account of

doctor Lemuel Gulliver. This is a kind of a minute realism which contrast with

the impossible and fantastic situation of the story. Swift uses realistic conven-

tion to make his satire more effective and to involve the reader in his fictio-

nal world. He uses the first person narrator who is himself the target of satire,

infact this book is a bitter satire on human irrationality and the political si-

tuation in England. In this way Swift exposes mankind defects.