Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift

...but, as I recently realised, Gulliver's Travels is more than just a tale of small and big. There really is something for everyone here. Travels to new lands and meeting new peoples for the science fiction fan, political satire for the historian, gross out humour for the child in us all, and best of all a classic tale of humanity explaining what it means to be human for everyone.

When I originally wrote this op in 2001 I had just re-read ...
...had the pleasure of re-visiting Gulliver's lands in their first edition form as part my freelance work so I thought it must be time for an update.

The first link to Sloane and his times that I found was the idea of the absurd travel narrative. Gulliver's adventures tell of his adventures in strange, undiscovered parts of the world and such books were very popular, and ripe for satire, in 1726. Swift mocks the over zealous attention ... more

Like most, I grew up with an some idea of the adventures of Lemuel Gulliver. Swift's wandering hero is thought of mainly as a subject for children these days but, as I recently realised, Gulliver's Travels is more than just a tale of small and big. There really is something for everyone here. Travels to new lands and meeting new peoples for the science fiction fan, political satire for the historian, gross out humour for the child in us all, and best of all a classic tale of humanity explaining what it means to be human for everyone.

When I originally wrote this op in 2001 I had just re-read Jonathan Swift's classic novel as a part of a self-education scheme in early Georgian satire. I was and am still working on a biography of Sir Hans Sloane (althought the scope of the project has changed over time) and I wondered if any references to him would appear. There was nothing direct but several elements of my subject's life came in for a sound sarcastic treatment. I recently had the pleasure of re-visiting Gulliver's lands in their first edition form as part my freelance work so I thought it must be time for an update.

The first link to Sloane and his times that I found was the idea of the absurd travel narrative. Gulliver's adventures tell of his adventures in strange, undiscovered parts of the world and such books were very popular, and ripe for satire, in 1726. Swift mocks the over zealous attention to detail provided by authors such as Sloane in his Voyage to Jamaica (2 vols., 1707-25).

The authors meant to be helpful. They provided recipes, gave directions, and offered new discoveries for the wonderment of those back home. Books about supposed voyages of discovery were becoming ever more absurd. And, while many of the efforts of intrepid explorers were sincere, the effect was not always serious. Soon even a trip to France could inspire a travel book and Sloane's mentor, Martin Lister, actually wrote one, A Journey to Paris in the Year 1698 (1699). [Echoed many years later and with different intentions by Lawrence Sterne's wholly modern approach, A Sentimental Journey, 1768.]

Gulliver's adventures are so far out of the known world as to make them worthwhile. Of course these days students of social history relish even the most mundane details of times gone by but to Swift enough was enough. Like the ubiquitous 'Letter to a Friend' pamphlets that littered London, the travel narrative needed living up and the new ideas being presented needed fresher ways of being expressed. It would be centuries before Bill Bryson would be born and make the telling of everyday travels an art.

Lemuel Gulliver to the rescue! This ship's surgeon and sometime hosier is the most unfortunate traveller there ever was, with the possible exception of Robinson Crusoe. Gulliver has a hard time travelling anywhere he wants to go. His adventures are the results of shipwrecks or other misadventures.

The original title of Swift's classic was Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World and it describes the work perfectly. Gulliver's adventures are divided into four parts. While trying to get to the South Seas, his ship meets with a storm. Gulliver finds himself the only survivor and visitor to the land of Lilliput.

Here Gulliver is a giant; in Lilliput even the horses are only four and a half inches tall. The emperor (read George I) and his court quickly realise that whoever controls Gulliver, the Man Mountain, can change the course of history. He is a secret weapon against rival countries and factions within the country. Blefescu (read France) had better watch out! Gulliver has all the benefits of favour in Lilliput until he puts out a fire in the royal palace in an unfortunate way. (He meant well but the Empress objected to a large stream of urine showering her home and saw it as in insult!) Lilliput's inhabitants are shown up for their excessive pride, love of titles, and silly reasons for fighting wars. They satirise real people and the effect is often very funny.

Gulliver's next adventure takes place in the land of Brobdingnag. Here he is the size a Lilliputian was to him.Gulliver is now a curiosity; a pocket sized oddity like the tiny sheep he brought from Lilliput to England. And here is another link to Hans Sloane, the greatest collector of curiosities in the land and maybe even the world. Gulliver makes a point of collecting odd things to bring back (he always assumes he's getting back somehow) and the things he collects, like a giant wasp stinger from Brobdingnag, are the sorts of things that real collectors of the time would have coveted. He intends to keep some mementoes for himself and some he plans to donate to the Royal Society. But before he can do this he needs to survive in a land of giants whose booming voices deafen him and whose large bodies magnify all their imperfections. Survival is a theme here and Gulliver has several near death experiences in this part.

Part Three sees Gulliver in a strange assortment of lands - Laputa, Balnibarbi, Glubbdubdrib, Luggnagg, and Japan. Yes, Japan, the real country, and yes, he goes there. Laputa is my favourite of these bizarre places. This is a flying island (see what I mean about science fiction?) which is inhabited by musicians and mathematicians who require the assistance of 'flappers' to help them communicate. A flapper will hit the ear of the person who is meant to hear something a person who has has his mouth hit has to say. This is apparently a satirical reference to the often distracted Isaac Newton who was too busy thinking deep thoughts to pay attention. The flying island's scientists perform bizarre experiments some of which come straight of the Royal Society's periodical, The Philosophical Transactions (editor, one H. Sloane). The Royal Society has been renamed the Grand Academy of Lagado in Gulliver's world. Clothes don't fit and houses are crooked on Laputa because theory has taken over practice. It's an odd place but it manages to oppress a city it floats over called Lindalino.

Lindalino is really Dublin and the story of the Lindalinian rebellion is based on real events in which Swift played a part. This section is now routinely printed in the Travels but it wasn't added until 1896. Swift's publisher found it too hot to handle for political reasons and then the page it was written on was lost for 270 years! Part Three is the most 'scientific' part of the Travels and is most like a traditional voyage of discovery narrative.

Part Four is the part in which Gulliver finds out what it means to be human and he is in for a shock. Set ashore by buccaneers on the island of the Houyhnhms, Gulliver is once again stranded. As Gulliver meets with other cultures he grows to see the follies in his homeland as well as those of foreign countries. His final destination is among the cultured horse people called the Houyhnhnms and he is horrified to realise that he is one of the most loathsome creatures on the planet, that is, a Yahoo, or human being. Yahoos are truly disgusting. They are irrational, smelly, uncouth, and cruel. Gulliver is appalled to be one and you'll know just what he means by the time he finishes his voyages. Terrifying creatures greet him with hostility until he is saved from harm by a Houyhnhm. On this strange island the horses are the masters and the hairy, smelly Yahoos are wild and uncivilised.

Gulliver is repulsed by the horrible Yahoos and loves the kind and gentle Houyhnhms. But alas, he is a Yahoo and he can not stay among the wonderful horses. So, at last, he travels home to stay. But from now on he'd rather live in a stable than in a house.

Gulliver's Travels is a great book rich in adult humour. (If you thought 'Master Bates' came from Captain Pugwash, think again). Satire plays a key role as courtiers, physicians, politicians, the scientists of the Royal Society and many more are brilliantly lampooned. Toilet humour is rife and it's worth getting an unabridged copy if you want the full Georgian effect as Swift intended. (My home copy is a Penguin Popular Classic which cost a pound and came complete with maps showing the supposed locations of the islands visited by Gulliver.)

So why read a book dating from 1726? And why bother finding a copy for grownups? Gulliver's Travels is a story well told. The follies of our ancestors still live among us and we can easily recognise them. Chances are you'll only be familiar with Lulliput and Brobdingnag if you remember the Travels from childhood (the other two parts are often neglected) or you'll have missed out on the coarser humour in a cleaned up version. Gulliver's Travels is also a part of literary history as a proud ancestor of the modern novel. It is full of wit, insight, anger, folly, and humanity. It is, without a doubt, a timeless classic.
 

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