"Then something moved on my foot. It moved over my body and up to my face. I looked down and I saw a man. He was smaller than my hand. Forty more little men followed him."
This is Gulliver in Lilliput. He travels across the sea from England and has an accident. He arrives in a country of very, very small people. What will they do with him? How will he talk to them? And why are the Big-enders fighting the Little-enders? Is their fight really important?
Readers know that the stories about the country of Lilliput and the other countries in Gulliver's Travels are not true. But when we read the book, we see our world through the eyes of the little people - and later, through the eyes of big people and horses.
Swift wants us to think about our ideas and our lives, and perhaps to change them. But at the same time, we enjoy the stories. Children like them because they are clever and funny. But Gulliver's Travels is for people of all ages. Swift wanted everybody to learn from his book.
Jonathan Swift was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1667. He went to university - to Trinity College, Dublin - and after that he worked for a writer in London. Then he wrote too.
Swift wrote well about the ideas of his time. But some people did not like his new ideas, and in 1714 Swift went back to Ireland. He wanted to help the Irish people, and he wrote about the English in Ireland who were often unkind people. At the same time, Swift wrote Gulliver's Travels. The book was in the shops in 1726 - and it is there now.
CONTENTS
click on the chapters to start reading
Part 1. A JOURNEY TO LILLIPUT
Tasks to chapters 1 - 4 (part1)
Part 2. GULLIVER IN BROBDINGNAG
Tasks to chapters 1 - 3 (part 2)
Part 3. GULLIVER IN THE COUNTRY OF THE HOUYHNHNMS
Tasks to chapters 1 - 3 (part 3)
click on the chapters to start reading
Part 1. A JOURNEY TO LILLIPUT
Part 2. GULLIVER IN BROBDINGNAG
Part 3. GULLIVER IN THE COUNTRY OF THE HOUYHNHNMS
