I don't even think the narrator was annoying, I think it is the excessive descriptions. I hate busy stuff: stories and coloring book pages with tons of unneeded detail. It clouds my brain and makes me bored very easily. I really don't care about an extensive description of the land, what the people looked like or Gulliver.
Moving on.
Was I the only one who thought of More's Utopia when reading about the Lillipian people's customs? There was some pretty hardcore shit in there! Like page 62 saying fraud was a greater crime than theft and the offender would. E punished with death. I can't find the part that I'm thinking about but I remember the people work for several hours and sleep for a short amount of time, this sounded kind of Utopian to me as well. The most hardcore thing I found was on 65, which discussed how the children aren't raised by their families and are allowed visits once a year and only a kiss at the beginning and end of the visit, but no toys or fondling could occur. No wonder people like the Treasurer and Bogalom were so damn bitter! Fucking pricks! lol
And what's up what's up with the high heels vs low heels? All I could think about during the description of this lame feud was Prince and Miguel running around in their high heeled boots.
I can see the similarities you point out. I'm not sure if the whole being raised by not-parents is really what messed up the the bitter little men. If they were the only ones who were sent away as children then I could believe it. Unfortunately for them this is a societal custom so really I can't blame their terrible personalities/behavior on not seeing their families enough. I think they're just jerks.
ReplyDeleteI noticed the similarities between Gulliver's Travels and Utopia as well. Swift used a lot of satire to compare the people and actions in his writing to the people and actions occurring in the world around him. The kids being sent away to grow up with someone other than their parents is similar to how the rich of Swift's time occasionally sent their children off to boarding school. I believe that the families not giving their kids toys and barely seeing them can be connected to Swift's own past. Since he was not the first born kid he would not have gotten as much attention as his elder siblings nor would he have gotten as good of an education. We all know that Swift pulled his ideas from the world he grew up in, so why not draw from his personal past?
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