Imagine waking up on a strange beach, unable to move, only to find you are tied down by hundreds of tiny pieces of string. Around you, six-inch-tall people are shooting microscopic arrows at your face. This is the famous opening of Gulliver’s Travels, a fantastic adventure novel that is celebrating its 300th anniversary since its first publication in October 1726.
In the words of English dramatist John Gay, Gulliver’s travels is ‘universally read, from the cabinet council to the nursery’, everybody knows it because of its many adaptations: from children books to Hollywood films. The long list of famous figures who commented publicly or privately during Swift’s century on Captain Lemuel Gulliver’s memoirs includes George Orwell who wrote ‘If I had to make a list of six books which were to be preserved when all others were destroyed, I would certainly put Gulliver’s Travels among them’
But why is this masterpiece still one of the most successful books three centuries after it was written?
Because it has different layers and every type of reader feels engaged and involved while reading. Children appreciate the different worlds and people Lemuel Gulliver meets in his voyages, young adults focus on the many ridiculous parts of the book while adults can see the way Swift criticized the British government, politicians, and human nature itself.
Gulliver’s adventures take him to fantastic lands, each representing a different aspect of human nature and society. The first is Lilliput (The Land of the Tiny): Gulliver washes ashore on an island where the citizens are only six inches tall. At first, they seem cute, but Gulliver quickly learns they are incredibly arrogant and cruel. They fight dynamic, bloody wars over completely trivial matters, such as which end of a boiled egg is the correct one to break. Swift uses the Lilliputians to mock the petty political arguments of his time. The second land is Brobdingnag (The Land of the Giants): In total contrast to his first voyage, Gulliver finds himself a tiny dwarf in a world of giants. Here, the situation is reversed. The King of Brobdingnag is horrified when Gulliver proudly explains the wars, weapons, and political systems of Europe, concluding that humans must be a race of “little odious vermin.” After leaving Brobdingnag he enters the flying island of Laputa: On his third journey, Gulliver meets the population made of scientists and philosophers. These thinkers are so obsessed with abstract theories that they have lost all practical common sense, leaving their houses badly built and their fields ruined.
Last but not least The Land of the Houyhnhnms: In his final and most disturbing journey, Gulliver meets the Houyhnhnms, a race of highly intelligent, rational horses. The island is also inhabited by Yahoos—filthy, brutal, human-like creatures. Gulliver is shocked to realize that humans are actually identical to the disgusting Yahoos.
These voyages are the perfect starting point for many engaging activities to celebrate the anniversary of this masterpiece.