Gulliver's Travels

Gulliver's travels, first published in 1726, was an immediate success and was read 'from the cabinet - Council to the nursery' (Gay). it continues to appeal to readers of all ages, both as a travel book and as a powerful satire. George Orwell rates it among the six most indispensable books in world literature. Gulliver travels to four extraordinary places. In the first, people are five or six inches tall; in the second, sixty or seventy feet; the third is a kind of satellite inhabited by absurdly impractical scientists; and the fourth is a country governed by horses who treat humans as filthy animals. Jonathan Swift uses the imaginary voyage as an instrument for his satire on mankind, reflecting on morals, social habits, political events and ideals, and exposing hypocrisy and cant. The fantastically inventive fictional world he creates provides a critique of human nature and its institutions. Jonathan Swift's attack on the futility of science which is not applied to human betterment in its widest sense, is relevant to today's post-industrial culture.