Jonathan Swift

(1667-1745) was part of the inner circle of the Tory governmen

t.

With the death of Queen Anne and

ascension of George I in 1714, the Whigs

returned to power and the Tory leaders were

tried for treason.

With the return of the Whigs, Swift left

England and returned to Ireland in exile, to live "like

a rat in a hole".

In Ireland, Swift turned his pamphleteering skills

in support of Irish causes, producing some of his most memorable works, earning him the

status of an Irish patriot.

Across Ireland, poor Catholic children

were living in squalor because

their families were too poor to keep

them fed and clothed.

"A Modest Proposal for Preventing the Children of Poor

People from Being a Burden to their Parents, or the

Country, and for Making them

Beneficial to the Public”

The tract proposes "a fair, cheap, and easy

method" for converting the

starving children of Ireland into "sound

and useful members of the Commonwealth."

“I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young

healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing,

and wholesome food...”

His proposal is to fatten up

undernourished children and feed them

to rich land-owners. Poor children could be sold at a meat market

at age one.

ADVANTAGES of this Proposal:

•combat overpopulation and unemployment,

•spare families the expense of child-bearing while providing them with a little extra income,

•improve the culinary experience of the wealthy, and

•contribute to the overall economic well-being of Ireland.

“A Modest Proposal” is the first documented

satirical essay.

Swift next began writing his masterpiece, Travels into Travels into Several Remote Nations of Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts, by the World, in Four Parts, by

Lemuel Gulliver, first a Lemuel Gulliver, first a surgeon, and then a surgeon, and then a

captain of several shipscaptain of several ships,, better known as Gulliver's

Travels.

Much of the material reflects his political experiences of the preceding decade.

Gulliver's Travels

(1726) was published under a

pseudonym, the fictional

Lemuel Gulliver.

Often published in abridged form as a

children's book, Travels is a

sophisticated satire of human

nature based on Swift's

experience of his times.

Each of the four books--recounting four

voyages to fictional exotic lands--has a

different theme, but all are attempts to

deflate human pride.

Part I: A Voyage to LilliputGulliver is

washed ashore and awakes to

find himself prisoner of a

race of people 6

inches tall.

Gulliver assists the Lilliputians in subduing their neighbors

the Blefuscudians by stealing their fleet. However, he

refuses to reduce the country to a province of Lilliput,

displeasing the King and the court. Gulliver is charged with treason and sentenced to be

blinded.

The feuding between the Lilliputians and the

Blefuscudians is meant to represent the feuding

countries of England and France, but the reason for

the war is meant to satirize satirize the religious feud between the religious feud between Catholics and ProtestantsCatholics and Protestants.

Part II: A Voyage to

Brobdingnag

Gulliver is abandoned by his companions

and found by a farmer 900 feet tall, who brings Gulliver home. His daughter

cares for Gulliver. The farmer treats him as a curiosity

and exhibits him for money.

The Queen of Brobdingna

g loves Gulliver and buys him to keep as a favorite at

court.

•In between small adventures, Gulliver discusses the state of Europe with the King, who is not impressed.

•Gulliver gets picked up by a giant eagle who drops him into the sea where he is picked up by sailors who return him to England.

Part III: A Voyage to Laputa, Balnibarbi, Glubbdubdrib, Luggnagg and Japan

After Gulliver's ship is attacked by pirates, he

is marooned near a desolate rocky island

near India and is rescued by the flying island of Laputa . . .

On Laputa, inhabitants are so lost in thought that they constantly

run into one another.

Gulliver is taken to Balnibarbi to await a Dutch trader.

While there, he tours the country and sees the ruin brought about by

blind pursuit of science without

practical results.

He meets the Struldbruggs, who are completely senile, but

immortal. Gulliver returns home, determined never to travel again.

Part IV: A Voyage to

the Country of the

Houyhnhnms

Gulliver returns to sea as a captain. His crew members mutiny and leave him on the first

piece of land they come across so they can continue on as

pirates.

He is abandoned in

a landing boat and

comes upon a race of hideously deformed creatures.

He learns that horses here (Houyhnhnms,

"perfection of nature") are the rulers.

The hideously deformed creatures ("Yahoos") are human

beings.

•The Houyhnhnms are grave, rational, and virtuous; they have created a perfect society.

•They only tolerate the Yahoos and use them for menial services.

However, the Houyhnhnms rule that Gulliver, a Yahoo with

some reason, is a danger to their civilization, and he is

expelled.

He is rescued by a Portuguese ship, and

is surprised to see that the captain, a Yahoo, is a wise, courteous, and

generous person.

Gulliver returns home to England.

However, he is unable to reconcile

himself to living among Yahoos.

He becomes a recluse, remaining in his

house, avoiding his family, and spending several hours a day speaking with the

horses in his stables.

THEMES:1.A satirical view of the state

of European governments, and of petty differences between religions.

2.An inquiry into whether men are inherently corrupt or whether they become corrupted.

• The causes of Gulliver's misadventures become more malignant as time goes on - he is first shipwrecked, then abandoned, then attacked by strangers, then attacked by his own crew.

• Gulliver's attitude hardens as the book progresses.

• Each part is the reverse of the preceding part.

• No form of government is ideal.• Specific individuals may be good even

where the race is bad.• Gulliver progresses from a cheery optimist

at the start of the first part to a pompous misanthrope at the book's conclusion.