On my recent journeys through Europe, I have been re-reading Gulliver's Travels, a classic from the 1700s. I found it on Amazon for free and added it to my Kindle.
Gulliver's Travels is presented as a memoir in four parts, with each part telling an odd journey taken by Lemuel Gulliver, a surgeon and captain of a series of ships. He keeps getting stranded or wrecked at sea and ending up on mysterious islands.
The book is a satire both of human nature and of the genre of adventure fiction that was so popular in that era. In the societies Gulliver finds, the people share many traits with humans and Gulliver mocks them by showing how absurd we can be.
I read this book long ago and of course has seen many adaptations but had forgotten how rude it could be. In several scenes Gulliver's toilet habits are depicted in detail, including urinating on a queen. Elsewhere, he is stripped and used almost as a sex toy by lusting giants.
The book is tremendously funny and insightful, and I regret reading it in this era where all the world is known, as it would be more fun to have read it hundreds of years ago when people genuinely didn't know if there were giants or flying islands.
Gulliver's Travels is presented as a memoir in four parts, with each part telling an odd journey taken by Lemuel Gulliver, a surgeon and captain of a series of ships. He keeps getting stranded or wrecked at sea and ending up on mysterious islands.
The book is a satire both of human nature and of the genre of adventure fiction that was so popular in that era. In the societies Gulliver finds, the people share many traits with humans and Gulliver mocks them by showing how absurd we can be.
I read this book long ago and of course has seen many adaptations but had forgotten how rude it could be. In several scenes Gulliver's toilet habits are depicted in detail, including urinating on a queen. Elsewhere, he is stripped and used almost as a sex toy by lusting giants.
The book is tremendously funny and insightful, and I regret reading it in this era where all the world is known, as it would be more fun to have read it hundreds of years ago when people genuinely didn't know if there were giants or flying islands.
