[Minor spoilers.]
I don't even know where to begin here. I knew it was going to be hard. The book is so incredibly vast and full of content that it's difficult to decide what needs to be talked about. And I certainly don't want to spoil everything. I think I am just going to recommend it now and then expose a few things about where this book took me.
The thing about "Gulliver's Travels" is that it is a fantastic adventure that is written as a satire on how incredibly horrible and stupid human beings are. Gulliver goes on four trips to sea (none of them go well), and end up stranded in four completely different locations that teach him a whole lot about himself and the society he hails from. I'll give a brief summary of the four locations:
1: Lilliput. This is the place most people are familiar with from the book. They are a race of extremely tiny people. Although they are very small, they think very big of themselves. That's the point.
2: Brobdingnag. Land of the giants! Here, Gulliver sees things from the perspective of someone very small. He is forced to be completely submissive to them in order to survive.
3. Laputa, Balnibarbi, Luggnagg, and Glubbdubdrib. Although these places are pretty distinct, the part that most people will remember was Laputa with their floating and navigable island. A lot of the issues with this area of the book is the fact that the elites on the island are basically promoting a sort of stupidity in their culture and pitching it as a modern enlightenment. There's a lot of hilarious stuff that I unfortunately also see in today's world.
4. Houyhnhnms. The most interesting and most damning part of this book. Land of talking horses! The horse people (because I cannot pronounce the name of their race) are a race of stoic, elf-like equines that know nothing of deception, vice, or corruption. They live with a savage race called the Yahoos who are essentially humans in feral form. This section of the book is not to be shrugged off. It unveils the evil and corruption present in the human world, not just then, but also today.
That last part really made this book for me. I didn't expect it, and I honestly felt a little sick when I realized what Jonathan Swift was trying to explain. This man, the author, was truly enlightened to what the problems of this world were and, frankly, are today.
I gotta say: sometimes fiction gets the point across better than just stating a fact. I checked online and found this book has a lot of haters. The irony is that the same people who hate this book are rather humorously called out by a man who has been dead for centuries.
If you are curious as to what is actually wrong with this world, what is wrong with humans in general, this book lays it out in a far better way than any other book I have ever read in my life. There is little to no deception here. Satire is the name of the game, and it will open your eyes to the harsh realities of your own species. After reading an incredible book like this, you are left with only two choices: you can either listen... or ignore it entirely. The choice is yours. Read this book.
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Interesting that the people who hate the book... ARE IN IT... and not as the heroes. Jonathan Swift was LAUGHING at them, even as he decried them in all seriousness, and that is what his haters cannot stand. Well, those few who hate him thoughtfully. Most such people are nonentities who let others do the thinking for them.
ReplyDeleteThe book remains relevant to this day and probably would have been relevant in any time in history.
DeleteI agree on all points, I totally recommend this book. I read this book my first year of college and loved it. Swift's writing is fun and to the point with his satire. I also read his essays which were fun as well.
ReplyDeleteIt's pretty timeless. I can see someone reading this in any era and seeing it's relevance.
DeleteGreat books are hard to review, because there is much that will need to be left out. Then, there are things you will only get by reading the book. The key is to point out what interests you, and leave them to respond.
ReplyDeleteYeah, it was really hard to lock down what I wanted to talk about. I left a lot out.
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