English 241: British Writers -- Nov. 1-5, 1998 -- Week Twelve

Gulliver's Travels

• What has been your knowledge of this book up to this time?
• Travel books were very popular during eighteenth century
• It is not a novel -
• It does not have the unity that the genre requires.
• The people are not realistic - they are there to represent other things.
• Finally, Swift alters Gulliver's persona to suit his needs.
• Books like Gulliver's Travels reflect a growth in literacy.

Book I

• How do you read Book I? What does it require you to do?
• Little people are petty - they are always fighting
• Once you understand the book is unrealistic, you read it on another level
• Why take us to another world to reflect upon our own world?
• Why the detail? Why the concern with bodily functions?

Book IV

• What is the nature of the Yahoos and Houyhnhnms?
• Consider the descriptions of each
• What does this allow Swift to do? How does this technique differ from what he did in Book I? In Book I, the target is the little people, in Book IV, the target become us.
• Are Yahoos supposed to represent humans?
• Look at the effect of Gulliver's describing things to the Houyhnhnms - when you have to explain everything to someone who knows nothing, you realize how stupid many of the things we do are.
• Hard and soft views of Voyage IV
• Hard: Swift intends for Gulliver's misanthropy to be an indictment of the human race.
• Soft: Gulliver is a figure of mockery - he has gone overboard in his rejection of the human race.
• Beware of oversimplification.
• Are the Houyhnhnms the ideal race Gulliver thinks they are?
• How do we know that Gulliver may not be speaking for Swift? Or, how do we know to be somewhat skeptical of Gulliver as readers?
• His meeting with the Port. capt. is important
• Look at what he says upon his return home
• His disgust with his family
• conversing with horses

What are the changes Gulliver undergoes throughout his voyage?

Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard -- Class time will be devoted to a close reading of this poem.

• Listen to a reading of the poem
• Opening stanzas -- the day is ending, but the ending of the day marks the beginning of the poet's insight into the lives of the country folk.
• The fifth stanza marks the point in the poem where the poet no longer concentrates upon the physical world that he observed in the first four stanzas.  From the fifth stanza on, the poem concentrates upon what goes through the mind of the poet -- his imaginings.
• The poem serves as a defense of the life these country people led.  Don't look down upon them because they did not seek fame or power.  It is important that a person experience friendship and love during his or her lifetime, not success and wealth.
• Poet imagines what a person might say upon his own death -- he hopes he will be remembered fondly.
• Three important people in this poem
• The poet
• The hoary-headed swain (lines 97-116)
• The kindred spirit (line 96 and lines 117-128 -- the kindred spirit reads the Epitaph)

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