Gulliver's Travels Social Sensitivity

Gulliver's Travels Social Sensitivity

Swift had high intentions to remedy some of the ills of the world through writing this work. He took care to put words in Gulliver's mouth and in accounts of his journeys, which made it clear that Gulliver was not to be mistaken for a kind and gentle man, nor one who was politically considerate of his fellow man.

Kathleen Smith writes of Gulliver's conversations with the King of Brobdingnag:

Gulliver's pomposity, lack of feeling, complacent amusement at the king's lack of political acumen, all are expressed in his way of writing; and they suggest man's readiness to become accustomed to wrong, to cruelty, if it is in his interest to do so.

Gulliver's account shows us, in its revelation of the responses of this representative human being, how easily we blind ourselves, by national pride, by excuses of political necessity, and so on,...
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