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Gulliver 's Travels By Jonathan Swift

Decent Essays

Gulliver’s Travels, a satire by Jonathan Swift, highlights various aspects of English society, of its time period, through Gulliver’s voyages and exposure to different cultures. On the surface, this satire is simply a fairy-tale, but with observation, Swift’s satirical comments can be easily identified and related to his society and even today’s American; such comments are criticizing aspects of society. These aspects include the struggle between those in powerful versus common man, corruption, and the true inner of “honorable” people One topic that this piece focuses on is the struggle between empowered men and unfortunate men. Gulliver arrives onto the floating island of Laputa which is filled with strange people who fail to make practical use of their knowledge. These people do have a king and Gulliver soon discovers that he is a tyrant. Below the island, is a region known as Balnibarbi which is in total control by the king. As a matter of fact, the king punishes any town in the region for their disobedience using two methods. “If any town should engage in rebellion or mutiny, fall into violent factions, or refuse to pay the usual tribute, the king has two methods of reducing them to obedience” (Swift #). These punishments include covering the town from above, or, in extreme cases, dropping the island on the town itself. “The first and the mildest course is, by keeping the island hovering over such a town, and the lands about it, whereby he can deprive them of the benefit

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