FREE ESSAY ON GULLIVER'S TRAVELS-- LITERARY ANALYSIS OF BOOK 1

GULLIVER'S TRAVELS-- LITERARY ANALYSIS OF BOOK 1

Literary Analysis of Book 1
In Gulliver's Travels, Swift and his character, Gulliver, have separate personalities.
Swift does not express his views through Gulliver, but through the place where he finds
himself and the people with whom he encounters.
Gulliver remarks about the Lilliputians in a straightforward way, reporting on the
cultures, rather than analyzing them. Swift basically disguises his allusions to the
political and philosophical thought of his time, allowing the reader, not Gulliver, to
discover them. This section can be read as a simple adventure story or as a complex
satire on morals and thought of the time period, which is precisely the underlying reason
Swift intended.
There is clearly an ironic comparison to English/European politics and philosophy. There
is evidence of a rich satire of the English politics of Swift's time. The small but
extremely immoral Lilliputians represent England. The significance of including a huge
difference in size between Gulliver and the Lilliputian was to show England's rank in the
world. England, although small, was the most powerful nation, able to conquer much larger
governments. It is satirical that the empire of such small people could pose a threat to
Gulliver, even though he was a giant to them 
Having said that the Lilliputians refer to England, Swift makes a remark of England's
arrogance for power when he wrote that the Lilliputians kept Gulliver tied up and
threaten him, never realizing that he could break free without effort and stomp all over
them. In Swift's mind, England was convince they were the best, most gracious power in
the world, and they closed their eyes to the obvious due to their huge ego. The small
size of the Lilliputians is in inverse proportion to the amount of their corruption.