Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels

Paul Baines (University of Liverpool)
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Jonathan Swift’s

Gulliver’s Travels

, as it is familiarly known, was published anonymously in 1726, under the title

Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World

. Swift was by this time a bitter exile from England, uncomfortable in his role as Dean of St. Patrick’s, Dublin, and strongly opposed to the government of Sir Robert Walpole, whose efforts to impose an underfunded copper coinage on Ireland Swift had fiercely and successfully resisted in a series of recent pamphlets.

Gulliver’s Travels

was, as Swift realised, an even more dangerous satire and its publication was deliberately surreptitious; the bookseller appears to have taken his own precautions, and interfered with the first published text. As well as political (and moral) targets, the book is in part a parody of the…

2925 words

Citation: Baines, Paul. "Gulliver's Travels". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 11 August 2004 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=4822, accessed 19 March 2024.]

4822 Gulliver's Travels 3 Historical context notes are intended to give basic and preliminary information on a topic. In some cases they will be expanded into longer entries as the Literary Encyclopedia evolves.

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