Name: The Magic City
Rating: 3.293522267206478 (247 reviews)
ISBN: 9781587170249

E. Nesbit

An extremely unhappy ten-year-old magically escapes into a city he has built out of books, chessmen, candlesticks, and other household items.

The Magic City

Jonathan Swift

The unusual voyages of Englishman Lemuel Gulliver carry him to such strange locales as Lilliput, where the inhabitants are six inches tall; Brobdingnag, a land of giants; an island of sorcerers; and a nation ruled by horses.

Gulliver's Travels

Greg Talbot

A picaresque tale of Mr. Lemuel Gulliver’s peculiar discovery of non-human empires, “Gulliver’s Travels” is the rare “children’s book” that adds moral complexity and existential terror to bright adventures. I was very excited to read this book after coming across David Runciman’s excellent podcast on the book in his series of political fiction. There is so much to admire in the storytelling. The symmetry of the four adventurous stories, each interspersed with hijinks of a travel gone wrong. There is a groundedness to Gulliver that echoes another childhood absurdist classic “Alice in Wonderland”. Gulliver is noticeably observant as a character, opinionated to the reader, but obsequious to empire and nobility. Fascinatingly, Gulliver's powerful presence alters dramatically per section depending on if he is in contact with the diminutive Lilliput people or the masterful Houyhnhnm. The lottery of birth that rules our lives and makes us pawns or kings is played upon Gulliver as each interaction with the strange empire allows for different power and influence. Having read Swift’s biting satire “A Modest Proposal" I was always feeling the edge of Swift’s caustic wit. Gulliver’s appeal to the sagacious European colonial powers is uncut in every section. Gulliver’s overly saccharine defense of “civilization” and the queen is trounced upon by emperors that point to their barbarism, avarice, and precipitous rule. Each story plays some role in satirizing elements of the empires that Gulliver observes: civil advancement: brutish strength, scientific advancement, and Edenic tranquility are butted against evidence to the contrary. But as the story goes on, we see the farce of Gulliver’s abiding faith in empire and even mankind itself. The vocabulary is astonishing. The original illustrations by Milo Winter are detailed and playful. It’s the rare adventure story where the adventures of the mind outstrip the peripatetic sea adventures. Through Gulliver’s curious lens, we contend with Laputia mortals whose longevity we grow to fear. His survival instincts alert the reader against predatory wasps and bullyish courtesans in the empire of Brobdingnag. His outsiderness is always with the reader as he attempts to find the good graces of rulers in his intrusions. There is also a remarkable amount of humor - specifically with the body. Guilliver’s proportionality to large or small people, has him reassessing the beauty of breasts, or the immodesty of defecation before a crow of tiny people. We see a yahoo literally eat poop, a reminder of the bestial qualities in their people - and a reminder that Gulliver’s lineage holds little distance. As no surprise to anyone who has encountered Gulliver’s travels, the last section is magnificent. There is a subtlety to the ways in which Gulliver changes through the first three stories. An undaunted courage and wily pluck get him through adventures that would kill a lesser man. And yet, his encounter with the horse kingdom of Houyhnhnm was utterly brilliant. Realizing his own inferiority, Gulliver has no rejoinder to Houyhnhnm leader who challenges his yahoo lineage. The folly and brutality of the western world is attacked by Swift. From our obsession to gold pieces, to base and wanton cruelty, to shameful lust, piety to peddlers, and disgust with our animal natures; it’s a tour de force to burn down the enlightenment project so artfully. As a reader, we see the change in Gulliver seeing himself in a lake reflection, and the deadening realization that beneath his European garb is the ridiculous consuming body of a middle aged man. We are left with an indictment on our humanity - all our achievement vanity, all our goodwill in advancement to ourselves. To read Gulliver’s Travels in 2025 is transporting, but also revealing. The wishes to transcend our humanity may look different with our digitized era, but the root wills are the same. There are eerie ways that Swift anticipates a large-language model - almost an analog version one is described. We see the folly and short-sightness of warring leaders, and prodigious egos. This is a story about how adventure not only leads us into new lands, but also disillusions us. We are both explorers and the explored. The master of the trip, but the slave to our nature. Ultimately reality offers us a bracing strange reflection - we are beasts through and through. Reading "Gulliver's Travels' is the experience of seeing the world anew and finding ourselves strange. It is melodious with words and unwavering in it's song - i've read few books that feel so epic and idea focused. And yet, it's a parable for modern readers on the limits of progress. We see the cracks in our fables and undetered base nature - but we have hope and the grace of spirit to carry on.

Gulliver's Travels (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) (Barnes & Noble Classics)

Tim Pendry

It is remarkable that a book published nearly 300 years ago is still not merely readable but entertaining. Swift's satire of contemporary politics remains both of these. Other than some words which can be understood by context ('hanger' for sword), the language is our language. His Gulliver is no intellectual but he is not stupid. He comes across as eminently likeable - a bit of a chancer perhaps but with no malice in him whatsoever. His responses are never naive but they are those of a man who wants to see the best in a situation and in people. He starts off at least without doubts as to his own culture, civilisation and status in life. He defers to his 'betters' out of principle as well as necessity. All he wants to do is earn a pot to feed his family back home and to do so through honest labour. He is a free-booting English adventurer of the old type, a mentality to be crushed in stages by the Victorian home, the welfare state and general wokery. Swift's lack of preciousness about bodily functions is refreshing. Swift criticises his own kind through a good and decent example of it. Of course, the contemporary political references are now only for antiquarians. The satire, however, is directed at far more than the contingent foibles and failures of early eighteenth century society and politics. It is directed at the human condition itself. The Grand Academy of Lagado remains, for example, a brutal satire on the political projectors and think tank wonks of today as much as then. I am afraid I recognised the Laputans as direct ancestors of many Futurist acquaintances with their existential fears and confused reasoning. Swift is above all a humanist. Today's reader will be surprised at his contemporary designation as a High Tory since his analyses of our species and of society lead time and time again to quite radical conclusions more associated with the modern intelligent Left (not that much of that remains). His 'conservatism' lies only in the recognition that, whatever he may wish humanity to be, humanity is as it is and so these follies and foibles must continue regardless of the ambitions of the 'projectors' - and so it has proved 300 years later. Plus ca change. We all know the stories of Lilliput (Gulliver as giant) and Brobdingnag (Gulliver as tiny) but the tales of the isles to the east of Japan (including Laputa) and of the land of the Houyhnhms and Yahoos are worth the extra effort. The book becomes sadder as it proceeds and is not for children. The first two parts are rollicking satires of human and lordly pretension with enough incident, even if bowdlerised (such as Gulliver peeing on a palace fire in Liiliput), to entertain children. The third and fourth begin to show much more of the self-delusion and cruelty of our species. Gulliver has a form of mental breakdown during his fourth voyage in which his identification with intelligent horses, who behave like model noble Romans who farmed their plots before the Republic tore itself apart, makes it impossible for him to live easily as a human afterwards. Indeed, his alienation from his own kind (including his family) seems to turn towards psychosis. Set against Christian and classical ideals, he sees us, 150 years before Darwin, as a form of jumped up Hobbesian brute. He yearns, in effect, to become a human horse, to become an 'ideal'. Thus we see the fate of all highly intelligent good-hearted intellectuals faced with social reality - you either have a moan (and that is what the eminently sane Swift does in this book) or you go mad. Swift allows himself the luxury of a safe and vicarious insanity through Lemuel Gulliver. This dark side of the book is seldom noted either because our attention is caught by the rollicking fun of the first two parts or we stand back and enjoy the satire without thinking that it is actually directed at our very core, perhaps at our 'original sin' of simply being what we are. The edition I used cannot easily be found on Goodreads (it is a 1960s Harper Perennial Edition from the US with an excellent short academic introduction and no cuts) but any reasonable modern edition will do. A knowledge of early modern history and culture helps but is not necessary.

Jackson Weaver

oh my lord i didn't know boredom could reach these hellish depths

'I cannot but conclude the bulk of your natives to be the most pernicious race of little odious vermin that nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the earth.' Shipwrecked on the high seas, Lemuel Gulliver finds himself washed up on the strange island of Lilliput, a land inhabited by quarrelsome miniature people. On his travels he continues to meet others who force him to reflect on human behaviour - the giants of Brobdingnag, the Houyhnhnms and the Yahoos. In this scathing satire on the politics and morals of the 18th Century, Swift's condemnation of society and its institutions still resonates today.

Gulliver's travels

Steffi'sBookShelve

Ik ben niet echt onder de indruk van dit boek en had er meer van verwacht.

Paul Turner

Sarah Sammis

I own an ancient copy but I think I love the book more for its manufacture than the story contained within.

Ian Higgins

"Gulliver's travels purports to be a travel book. It is a blend of fantasy and realism and describes the shipwrecked Gulliver's encounters with the inhabitants of four places: Lilliput, Brobdingnag, Laputa, and the country of the Houyhnhnms"--Provided bypublisher.

Claudia Beneyto

half of the book is an absolute bore, the other half mediocre at best. i really don’t care about the irony and originality that shapes the book because we could have read anything else for my 18th century english lit class and they chose this. absolutely not.

** spoiler alert **
           
Gulliver's Travels is a book about a man that dislikes his family so much that he'd rather spend his time attending a miniature kingdom, being tossed about by giants, talk to completely deluded scientists and attempt to ingratiate himself with super-intelligent horses. Or perhaps it's all the ravings of a madman deserted on an island for too long.

*FORENOTE - The edition I read is super old, I have no idea if any improvements have been made or sections fixed/removed.*

The first half of the book was interesting and the story well-developed but around the end of the Brobdingnag section (giants) the book starts to repeat a pattern, with each of the journeys being a visit to some strange landmass where either the people are strange or there is something in their land that is. Gulliver is always received by the Royals of those nations and without trouble is given high respect and can do as he pleases, usually exploring the local culture. 

I particularly enjoyed the stay with the advanced horse race, there are clear parallels between the horse's ways of life and religious Indian/Asian cultures and customs found in Hinduism and Buddhism. Swift portrays the different casts as different breeds with their set roles in society, he spends many pages bringing up all the flaws found in western humanity which Buddhism teaches you to recognise and avoid. He also instills the reason and ration-based thinking in the horses that you would find in a wisened monk, but unlike in the Buddhist teachings they do not remotely indulge in love or closeness past neighbourly-ness (excuse the pun) which is part of the whole 'Middle Path' or 'Noble Eightfold Path'. 

As a set of short stories this is a fantastic book with many satirical nods and interesting concepts that exaggerate the travels of others in that time, but if you take it as a continuation from one tale to the next then you'll find very little carry-over. None of the past events come up again except in the summary chapter at the end, also the further you reach in the book the quicker and less developed the tales are, I found it best to treat them as little fantasy concepts expanded so as to give the reader something to think about for the day (see the discussion about struldbrugs in pt III).

Vajas Johanna 

I viaggi di Gulliver

Martina

I viaggi di Gulliver, libro più famoso di Jonathan Swift racconta, come si evince dal libro, quattro viaggi in quattro paesi diversi del medico chirurgo Lemuel Gulliver. 
Questo romanzo è scritto sotto forma di diario in cui il narratore racconta ciò che gli accade durante i suoi mirabolanti viaggi ricchi di avventure e sventure.
L'autore in questo caso si spaccia per editore a cui viene affidato il compito di pubblicare codesto libro scritto per mano di Gulliver di cui afferma essere parente.
Ogni viaggio è condotto a esprimere disprezzo verso la società inglese e man mano che il libro prosegue questo sentimento diventa sempre più evidente.
I primi due viaggi si basano su diverse prospettive e sui contrari, infatti, Gulliver a Lilliput si trova a essere un gigante tra i piccolissimi e meschini lillipuziani; mentre a Brobdingnag si trova a "vestire" i panni dei lillipuziani tra i giganteschi abitanti di Brobdingnag. Il dualismo che l'autore crea in questi primi due viaggi è affascinante.
Il terzo viaggio è quello che mi è piaciuto di meno in quanto l'ho trovato assai confusionario anche se presenta una critica tagliente nei confronti della Royal Society.
L'ultimo viaggio è veramente spettacolare, un mondo utopico governato dai cavalli e in cui l'uomo (anche se io ritengo essere una scimmia antropomorfa in quanto ha diverse fattezze dall'uomo moderno) è solo una bestia selvaggia che obbedisce solo ai vizi di Natura.
Swift mette in atto con questo romanzo una satira senza precedenti nei confronti di ogni cosa, comincia con la religione parlando dello scisma della Chiesa Anglicana messo in atto da Enrico VIII e continua nei confronti della politica, della società, della scienza e nei confronti dell'umanità in sé arrivando a disprezzare tutti gli Yahoo (o almeno questo è ciò che l'autore fa provare a Gulliver).
Altro fatto interessante di questo romanzo è presentato dal fatto che esso è scritto in chiave parodica per prendersi gioco dei romanzi marinareschi di cui Defoe è "fondatore".
Non voglio aggiungere altro perché nonostante alcune parti non siano state di mio gusto bisogna ammettere che questo libro è veramente geniale sotto molti aspetti.

Stefanie Sugia

i have to say it's been a long long journey reading this book, literally. Lemuel Gulliver takes me along on various unfortunate and unbelievable voyages, which he survived somehow. i do have to admit that this book is extremely unique with its' vivid imagination; but somehow i feel something lacking from this book. whether it might be lack of excitement, or lack of intensity, i don't know. or maybe it's just me being not very fond of a book published in 1726. but i have no regrets reading this book, because Jonathan Swift did have an amazing imagination in creating Gulliver's voyages. so here's the book review, consisting 2 out of 4 Gulliver's different voyages :)

http://thebookielooker.blogspot.com/2...

Bob Simone

Mumluk

Classic among classics, it's incredible how current the themes proposed by Jonathan Swift in 1726 are.

Sophia De La Garza

This was entertaining enough but not my cup of tea. Read for school and wasn't a pain, so a bonus star for that. 

3 out of 5 stars

nahla mujahed

It is indeed a very unique story plot and I enjoyed it however, I was sometimes for some reason confused along the lines of some chapters. But the ending was nice

Sonia Flores

2017 PopSugar Reading Challenge #14 A book involving travelç

Creo que si sobrevives a la primera parte del libro, vale la pena seguir adelante. Este libro es brillante, tiene ideas muy ingeniosas y representativas, pero puede volverse ridículamente aburrido en ocasiones. Quizá lo repetitivo de algunas situaciones, la constante observación de detalles obvios, la alta carga irónica combinada con largas explicaciones de ciertas circunstancias, se unen para hacer de la lectura algo tedioso en cierto punto. Pesado y odioso, incluso. No obstante, es una lectura que vale la pena si estás dispuesto a llegar hasta el final. Las inverosímiles aventuras de Lemuel Gulliver están llenas de interesantes perspectivas que despiertan la curiosidad.

The Magic City

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