Gullivers Travels

1
Gullivers Travels

• From Satire to Sadness

2
Quick Review

• LilliputGulliver accused of sexual misconduct
  with a six-inch tall woman
• Satirizes English fascination with aristocracy
  and the pettiness of the court
• BrobdingnagGulliver sees his own smallness
  deformation of human body and human culture
• Laputascience and techology coopted as tools of
  political power (Academy of Lagado satirizes
  Royal Academy of London)

3
Book 4

• How has Gulliver changed as a character from Book
  1 through Book 4?

4
Misanthrope

• Def a person who hates or distrusts humankind
• Gulliver literally comes to hate humans. He
  comes to prefer horses, or Hhouyhnyms.

5
René Descartes (1596-1650)

• Dualism distinguishes between physical and
  non-physical matter
• According to Descartes, the mind is composed of
  non-physical matter. Thus he distinguishes the
  mind/consciousness/rationality/soul from the
  brain and the body.
• Believed that animals are merely organic automata
  or machines they have no reason, no
  consciousness, no soul

6
Humans the rational animal?

• Swift Humans are not a rational animal but a
  rationis capax, a capable animal
• Humans are capable of reason, but as a whole they
  are corrupt

7
The Diseased Animal

• we fed on a thousand things which operated
  contrary to each otherwe ate when we were not
  hungry, and drank without the provocation of
  thirst that we sat whole nights drinking strong
  liquors without eating a bit, which disposed us
  to sloth, inflamed our bodies, and precipitated
  or prevented digestion (264).

8
Disease, cond

• p. 268 royalty are the most diseased b/c they
  are inbred and they pass on their unhealthy diets
• Humans lack of temperance in their physical
  appetites (for drink, food, sex) but in their
  moral diet also (power, greed, prideand, as any
  Guns and Roses fan knows, an appetite for
  destruction.).

9
Appetite for Things

• P. 273 Yahoos get sick b/c of their greed
• P. 229 Gulliver explains that sailors use cheap
  trinkets to trade with and dupe the natives
  (bracelets, glass rings and other toys)
• glassfake
• For Defoe, such items celebrate British
  Imperialism and ingenuity
• Market values drive out all other values. (If
  youre so smart, why arent you rich?)
• Swift suggests that inferior civilizations make
  inferior things.

10
Disease, contd

• Pride is the worst sin top of the 7 deadly sins
  reason for Satans revolt
• when I behold a lump of deformity and diseases
  both in body and mind, smitten with pride, it
  immediately breaks all the measures of my
  patience (311)
• Gulliver, however, becomes proud by the end of
  the novel.

11
Gulliver as Tragic Hero

• Gulliver goes crazy b/c he has seen humankind at
  its worst
• Has no self-awarenessdoes not realize his own
  pride
• Gullivers name shares its root with gullible
• In what ways is he gullible?

12
Houyhnyms

• Virtues friendship, honesty, benevolence
• Lessons taught to young (p. 281) temperance,
  industry, exercise, cleanliness
• Is anything off-putting about the Houhnyms?

13
The Fall

• Like the world before the fall
• No word for lying
• Dont understand why G wears clothes
• Problem with Hs is simplicity
• Gullivers expulsion is like the expulsion from
  Eden

14
More Human than Human

• Gulliver is a Yahoo p. 279
• For now I could no longer deny that I was a real
  Yahoo in every limb and feature, since the
  females had a natural propensity to me, as one of
  their own species.
• Don Pedro accepts that humans are corrupt, but
  Gulliver wishes to return to Houhnyms.
• Society has progressed so much that humans have
  forgotten what it means to be human
• Gulliver is a fallen man in a fallen world
• Are we all hopeless?