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Satire in Gulliver’s Travels
A satire can be defined as a fictions work that makes use of irony and sarcasm to poke fun to the general pathetic issues of humanity. It takes on trying to expose all forms of jazz, stupidity, and weaknesses of the society. On the other hand, we can define satire as a form of literary genre that is written to ridicule, scorn and derision vices, and folly in the society. Most are the times that satire is written to be a funny piece but it has a deeper meaning where it aims at delivering a form of irony and sarcasm on relatively sensitive subjects. Gulliver’s travels in it are a satire that was not written to entertain or woo. It was authored as a form of indictment and therefore ended up becoming a popular read among the indicted people in the society during that time; doctors, philosophers, politicians, Englishman, and scientists. In Gulliver’s travels, satire is heightened throughout the novel where it is written in a view to shame individuals, community, and religion seeking to foster improvement. In this novel, satire is presented throughout the plot, narration, and character setting. Jonathan Swift, the author of the book, uses an array of elements in setting namely utopia and dystopia. He also uses different characters; a miser, a tyrant, and a flat character to illustrate different character elements of the satirical novel. The author has a preferred first person narrator in Gulliver. Gulliver has been involved in vast and extraordinary circumstances during his four tours to differ and strange lands in the planet. Gulliver uses a straight to the point form of narration which makes it easier t realize the kind of a person he is. He appears to be an intelligent and educated person. However, he is presented as gullible and naïve (Ernst, 12). A case in example is when he is presented as a naïve consumer when he is buying Lilliputians imaging only because he is threatened by punishment. His condemnation of
Cited: Bloom, Harold. Jonathan Swift 's Gulliver 's Travels. New York: Bloom 's Literary Criticism, 2009. Internet resource. Ernst, Reni. Analysis of the Nature of Swift 's Satire in Gulliver 's Travels - Targets, Techniques and Effectiveness. München: GRIN Verlag GmbH, 2008. Internet resource. Jan, K M, and Shabnam Firdaus. Perspectives on Gulliver 's Travels. New Delhi: Atlantic Publishers and Distributors, 2004. Print. Swift, J, and Kearney, D. Gulliver 's travels: With an introduction and contemporary criticism. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2010. Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver 's travels into several remote regions of the world. Oxford university, 1865.