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H.G. Wells - College Essay

H.G. Wells

Rational Man: A critique and analysis of R.S. Crane's interpretive essay on Book IV of Swift's Gulliver's Travels Since its first publication nearly three hundred years ago, Jonathan Swift's satirical prose Gulliver's Travels has been the subject of a wide variety of literary critique and social interpretation. Although many readers, at first glance, take this tale to be simply a fantastic narrative of a common man and his encounters with unusual locations and people through several journeys, further inspection reveals Swift's true purpose of creativity - satire. Using the then contemporary style of the Travel Narrative, Swift is able to insert his own personal criticisms of modern life ...

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another bizarre journey of Gulliver, no more unusual than his other travels. However, upon further inspection, we see that Book IV criticizes the nature of man as a rational being (Crane, 402). Of interest to the readers of today is Swift's choice of creatures inhabiting this land; a barbaric, man-like creature dubbed the Yahoo, and the civilized, good-natured horse-like creature, the Houyhnhnms. R.S. Crane explains the reason for this choice in his essay "The Houyhnhms, the Yahoos, and the History of Ideas". Crane begins his analysis of Book IV by discussing how Gulliver is able to discard his preconceived notion of man as a superior being for a more cynical outlook after interacting with the inhabitants of Houyhnhnmland. Crane suggests that Gulliver's transition from a "lover of mankind"(403) to misanthropy comes as a result of a realization that man is not as he considers himself, but rather more "compatible, indeed, only with a formula, infinitely more humiliating to human ...

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H.G. Wells. (2004, July 22). Retrieved August 1, 2025, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/H-G-Wells/11421

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PAPER DETAILS

Added: 7/22/2004 11:53:27 AM
Category: English
Type: Free Paper
Words: 850
Pages: 4

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