Author: Jonathan Swift
Year: 1980 (1726)
Publisher: Forum
Language: Swedish (Translator Anna Berg-Mortensen)
Meaning is
floating. It is well established in the study of semantics and semiotics that
communication through words, symbols, gestures, rituals, artefacts, and actions
vary with the place, context, and time. A word that means one thing in one
situation may have a different meaning in another. A simple expression such as “thank
you” can carry a meaning of such disparate sentiments as gratitude, command,
distancing, and irony depending on the situation, interpersonal relationship, and tone
of voice. Meaning is transitory and particular to the moment in which it is
created.
One of the
most radical changers of meaning is time. Not the least in the realm of
literature. Literary history is littered with examples of masterpieces that
have been morphed over the centuries so that they are today read and enjoyed in
a completely different way than they were intended and received at the time of
their birth. Daniel Defoe wrote Robinson Crusoe as a testament to the rational
Christian man’s superiority over the elements (and other peoples) but is in our
times considered an exotic and somewhat naïve adventure for teenage readers.
Mark Twain’s intention with Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn was to highlight
the social injustice in 19th century America but has since then
moved through a period of nostalgic literature only to end up in the same
category as Robinson Crusoe. Moby Dick by Herman Melville seems to have moved
in the opposite direction. I was written to impress the masses but has slowly
been incorporated into the canon of American literature and is frequently
mentioned in discussions on the essential Great American Novel.
Similarly,
Jonathan Swift’s peculiar novel “Gullivers resor” (“Travels Into Several Remote
Nations Of the World, by Lemuel Gulliver” or simply “Gulliver’s Travels”), has
not been spared. The most recent movie adaptations as well as the cover art on
most modern publications of the novel give no signs of it being directed at
political scientists, pundits or policy-makers. Instead, they are in
matinee-format and even musicals and the books are brightly coloured and often
richly illustrated. This presentation is far removed from the original
intention of the book.
Jonathan
Swift was born in Ireland in 1667, less than 15 years after the end of the
Confederate Wars. He soon moved to England where he tried to establish himself
in the circles around Charles II. His ambition failed and after some years he
was sent back to Ireland with the modestly prestigious seat as Deacon of St
Patrick’s parish. This is where he began to write his most famous work of
literary fiction intended and designed as a fierce assault on all things that
the London elite pretended to: politics, power, money, knowledge, and honour.
Swift sends
his protagonist, Dr Lemuel Gulliver, on four different voyages to imaginary
lands, each of which allows him to dwell on particular features of English high
society.
Gulliver’s
first journey takes him to the land of the Lilliputians. Here he is faced with
tiny people who make great problems out of tiny issues. They go to war over
pointless matters, choose their senior government officials according to preposterous
criteria, carry grudges, lie, and deceive. By Liliput, Swift ridicules the
English political elite that dons ostentatious robes, use fancy vocabulary, and
make all the pretentions of great men.
Through Gulliver’s eyes, the thick display of pomp and circumstance
going on around his ankles can only appear as parodic and ludicrous.
The tables
would soon be turned. In his next journey, takes him to Brobdingnag which turns
out to be inhabited by giants. Having been left behind after a shore leave on
an unknown coast he is captured and put in a cage. Although well taken care of
and eventually settling into a reasonably comfortable lifestyle at the royal
court, where he earns the friendship and attention of the king and queen, he
remains a prisoner used for entertainment purposes. In his conversations with
the king, Gulliver tries his best to impress him with accounts of the
intricacies of English governance, judiciary system, and codes and morals. The
deeper into his descriptions he ventures, the more absurd English customs
appear to the king. He shrugs them off as unintelligible and without merit.
During his
penultimate excursion, the ship on which Gulliver serves as a ship’s doctor is
captured by pirates and Gulliver is put in a canoe to fend for himself on the
open sea. By a stroke of luck, he reaches a previously unknown archipelago
where he lands. Here he is soon surprised by an island floating in the air
which turns out to be Laputa, the dwelling and communication vehicle of the
ruler of Balnibarbi. In this episode, Swift goes after academia which he
perceives to be aloof and disconnected from reality. Every senior citizen on
Laputa is followed around by a servant, called “flapper”, whose main purpose is
to nudge or strike their master with a cane or a bladder filled with pebbles
from time to time to bring their attention back to the world around them, be it
for the purpose of following a conversation or not to walk off a cliff. Gulliver
seizes the opportunity to also visit the university town Lagado where various
scientists have invested lots of thought and made absolutely no advancement in
areas such as extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers, turning human excrement
back into food, or constructing a solar calendar based on the wind.
Gulliver’s
final and most decisive journey would also be the one that would ultimately
change his life. After having been deposed as captain in a mutiny, he is marooned
on an unknown shore. The first creature that he runs into makes an altogether
adverse impression on him. He observes that they had no tail and most of the
time walk on their hind limbs, their heads and parts of their torsos are
covered with thick hair but the rest of their bodies are naked. Moreover, they
are dirty, smelly, and loud. Surrounded by these beasts, he is rescued by two
gallant horses which quickly disperse the screeching flock. Slowly it dawns on
Gulliver, that the masters of this world are the highly intelligent, peaceful,
and serene horse-people called Houyhnhm, and that the vermin he had first
encountered, known locally as Yahoos, are in fact humans. Equally slowly, but
infinitely more painfully, he must eventually reconcile with the fact that to
the Houyhnhm, he is simply an unusually clean and communicative Yahoo. After
his inevitable return to England, disgusted at himself and the Yahoos which we
all at our essence are, he secludes himself from his family and society and
spends the remainder of his days professing the glory of the horse-nation. Swift,
finally, condemns forever mankind in its entirety.
As I read
the novel, it seems to me that Swift grew increasingly bitter as he progressed.
There is evidence that speaks against this proposal, most convincing of which
is that he wrote the part about Houyhnhm before he had finished the visit to
Laputa. Nevertheless, the leap from criticising the English elite, as he did by
Lilliput and Brobdingnag, to dismissing humanity as a whole seems like a
drastic escalation of Swift’s grievance. As the book was written over several
years, such an emotional evolution is by no means unlikely. The publisher even
had to delete some parts from the manuscript for fear of prosecution. This is
political satire through and through.
But as we concluded at the beginning of this review, material changes with time. Even if we accept that “Gullivers resor” is satire and designed to visualise the absurdity of politics, I suspect that we read it differently than its contemporaries would. To us, the satire appears largely Menippean showcasing a broad criticism of general characteristics of our society, but to the contemporary reader, it would have constituted a vicious attack on specific institutions and even individuals more or less carefully veiled. After all, our time would to Jonathan Swift be as foreign as Lilliput or Brobdingnag ever were to Lemuel Gulliver.
