Gulliver's Travels by Swift and the Goblin Market by Rossetti - Research Paper Example

Task Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift and the Goblin Market As it is described by Jonathan Swift, Lamuel Gulliver is among the third of the five sons who are born to the man of the modest means. Gulliver is of proper and good, although he is plain English stock-born to the Nottinghamshire, a country which is very ordinary with very little in the ways of excitement, he seems to be the epitome of the people of the British middle classes in his time. Gulliver’s name is suggesting, quite “gullible” Gulliver tends to believe in what other people tells him, and takes everything on his face value. Gulliver’s Travels is all about a detailed sets of the political conflicts, but it would have been long ago forgotten if it would have been nothing more than that. However, the Goblin Market is a poem which is narrated by Christina Rossetti’s, the poem describes the markets place dynamic and Rossetti depicts on how the” Goblin” or the merchant’s cries for the business. The merchants croon by shouting out loud for the crowd to come and buy, come and buy which they repeat it several times so that they can attract the customer’s attention to go, and buy their products. The merchant does this by preparing the list of the items in a paratactic manner. These two books try to analyze the ways in which the use of the strange and unfamiliar prompts the reader to think about the known and the familiar. All through the ages, the man has always struggled in defining the necessary situation of the utopian society. Writers along with philosophers proclaim that they discovered the key to perfect societal structure; however, they sometimes fall short in a number of aspects. The perfect society cannot easily be attained, and almost impossible to achieve it completely. Gulliver’s Travels, invites readers into the world which is ruled by the creatures who looks like the horses, recognized as Houyhnhnms, who in spite of being kind, calm, and coherent, they lack the critical thought as well as wisdom. These animals rule their whole lives on the morals of reason, good value, wisdom, and self-control, and they believe that, the only means of living is by being friendly as well as benevolent, to their own kindness. Gulliver’s Travel is a story of adventuring that involves several voyages of a man by the name Lemuel Gulliver, known to be a surgeon because of the series of the mishaps and an ability to route to the recognized ports and end ups on several of the unknown islands where he lives with the people as well as, animals of the unusual sizes, he is able to go back to his home in England where he gets to recover from the unusual experiences as well as , he sets out on the new voyage. The ways in which the use of the strange and unfamiliar prompts the reader to think about the known, and the familiar comes in when the ship Gulliver is destroyed in the storm but still we find Gulliver ending up on the island of the Lilliput, where when he wakes up, he finds that he had been captured by the Lilliputians, who are very small people approximately the six inches in height. Gulliver in turn, helps them to solve their problems, more so their conflicts with Blefuscu who are their enemies. Blefuscu is an island which is across the bay from them. Gulliver then falls from the favor, although, since he had refused to support an Emperor’s desires of enslaving. Gulliver then converts a huge war ship to be his as well as setting sails from the Blefuscu in order to be rescued when he was in sea by the English merchant ship plus to return to his home England (Wiener and Gary, 168). On the other hand, Rossetti’s “Goblin Market” truly resembles that of the contemporary day market places. Christina Rossetti does a tremendous job by portraying the malevolent merchants, and their craftiness ways. Rossetti then goes even farther, by describing how the merchant presents their fruits, they attract the attention of Laura, and they are able to barter with the unfortunate girl called Laura. Rossetti also describes the market place to be very well in other ways. The Goblin Market is a poem which is narrated by Christina Rossetti’s, the poem describes the markets place dynamic and Rossetti depicts on how the” Goblin” or the merchants cries for the business. The merchants croon by shouting out loud for the crowd to come and buy, come and buy which they repeat it several times so that they can attract the customer’s attention to go, and buy their products. The merchant does this by preparing the list of the items in a paratactic manner. Rossetti happens to do many things in order to show how the market place looks like, and how the market works. Some of the things that actually Rossetti stated happen to remind the readers of a type of the market that is found on the Canal Street in New York. When Rossetti describes the market, the description of that market happens to be very similar to one which is of a modern day market. For example, one lacks interests of buying of any of the items under transaction in the market place. For that case, we may conclude that, the strange and unfamiliar prompts Rossetti to think about the known and the familiar. This also comes in clear when a person has no interest of buying things sold yet, she, or he is sucked in by a siren-like calls of the merchants, or of the “Goblins”. In addition to that, some other merchants in the market place shares some descriptions which are of the same, this is either sharing them physically or metaphorically as it is described by Rossetti:“One had a cats face, One whisked a tail, One tramped at a rats pace, One crawled like a snail,” (71-74) Rossetti’s poem of the market descriptions gives the people some elements of mental pictures which are shady, wily, as well as, animal-like merchants. There are also some similarities that exist in the two different market places because of the products which are sold. Rossetti once more describes the “Goblin” or the merchandise, a fruit, as it comes from a place which is not to trust anymore "Who knows upon what soil they fed / their hungry thirsty roots?" (44-45).The merchants are given different types of the selling pitch by Rossetti. This is seen when Laura gets surrounded by different merchants, where each of the merchants did something that could attract the attention of Laura. For example, the merchant says “bade her taste in tones as smooth as honey” (Bloom and Harold, 107-108). Another merchant also “Spoke a world of welcome” (9), while the other one merchant “whistled like a bird” (Bloom and Harold, 114). This reminds listeners of the market place in comparable ways. For instance the “click-clack” of the sale advertisements, the screaming as well as the shouting for the products which are sold in stand, and also the whistling, are all ways of gaining competitive advantages in an organization for business. The way the merchants are negotiating when they are selling their products are another similar of the market place aspects which Rossetti reveals out in her poem. The attention of Laura is attracted by the screaming of the merchants while they shouted “Come buy, come buy” Laura then tells the merchants, or the goblins that she has got no money to buy their commodities, she says, “I have no copper in my purse” (118). She is again replied by the goblins, in unison, telling her that there is no problem but still she can buy the products by using her golden hair, they merchants say, “You have much gold upon your head” (123). Laura then decides to trade with them, and then pays the merchant for their fruit, “she clipped a precious golden lock . . . Then sucked their fruit globes fair or red” (Bloom and Harold, 126-128) Other ways in which the use of strange and unfamiliar prompts the reader to think about the known and the familiar is seen when one day Gulliver was sitting on the beach looking at the sea from the portable room, he is then snatched up by the eagle and then dropped inside the sea. It comes very strange when Gulliver’s chest is spotted on floating water by the passing ship and rescues Gulliver, and then returned to his home England so as to meet his families (Lemke, 49). According to Rossetti, the market place resembles the modern market place of today in a way that the merchants can now freely interact with their buyers. On the other hand, Rossetti outlines that, in the market place, there seems to be many people who are competing for sales. Rossetti also describes the merchants or the goblins to be as "Leering at each other" (93), as if they have spiteful strategy of selling products only to the new customer. Rossetti continues describing the constant clash between the merchants of Lauras business, "One set his basket down, / one reared his plate," and she continues describing what every goblin does in order for them to get a business.( Bloom and Harold (97-98). .Another case of the known and the familiar comes in when Gulliver takes a ship back to Levant where he is dispensed to be the captain of the sloop so as to visit the islands which are nearby as well as establishing a trade. It becomes so weird that while he was on the trip, the pirates’ attacks that place as well as the sloop and puts Gulliver inside a small boat. Gulliver then discovers the flying island called Laputa while he drifts at the sea. While on Laputa, Gulliver meets many inhabitants such as the king and all of them are preoccupied some things which are associated with music as well as mathematics. On his way he is again discovered by a herd of the ugly, human-like creatures called the Yahoos. The creatures attack him by climbing the tree as well as defecating on him. He is then saved from the disgrace when he sees horses and identifies the horses by their names, the Houyhnhnm, where one of the horses with the grey color takes Gulliver to his home, and introduced to a grey mare (his wife), the colt as well as a foal which was his children, and the sorrel nag who is the servant. Gulliver identifies that the Yahoos, and himself are the same animals but at the first he thought that the Yahoos are kept in the pens which are far away from the house (Wiener and Gary, 68). However, Gulliver is determined to be a Yahoo by the Kingdom Assembly, despite him being treated well in grey steed’s home. Gulliver is determined to be a Yahoo, and he therefore must live with uncivilized Yahoos or he must return to his world. Gulliver becomes very sad ant takes his leave of Houyhnhnms. He builds a canoe and he sails to the nearby island where is found hiding by the crew from Portuguese ship. The captain of the ship returns him to Lisbon hence living in the captain’s home. Gulliver then agrees to go back to the family in England. When he arrives, he becomes so repelled by the Yahoo family, and he then buys two horses as well as spending most of his time caring for and conversing with those horses in the stable so as to be far from his yahoo family. Conclusion At the end of the fourth book of Guillivers travels, it becomes clear that Houyhnhnms are very conscious of structure of their society; the Houyhnhnms are seen to be actively manipulating the society so as to preserve a status quo. When Houyhnhnms begins understanding Gulliver, the Houyhnhnms starts to see his Gulliver s beliefs as well as values and threats, such as Gulliver’s eagerness and firm belief to end the conflicts in wars, or to discover every sides of each discussion. As the relationship of Houyhnhnms and Gulliver progresses, they both realize that, all the Yahoos of the land have degenerated. At the assembly of the Houyhnhnms, a certain debate strikes out determining whether Yahoos are supposed to be exterminated out from the face of Earth. Gulliver’s master thus explains to Gulliver saying, “[the] Yahoos had not been always in their country: but that many ages ago two of these brutes appeared together... [they] engendered and their brood in a short time grew so numerous that to overrun and infest the whole nation. [The] Houyhnhnms, to get rid of this evil, made a general hunting, and at last enclosed the whole herd; and destroying the older, ever Houyhnhnm kept two young ones in a kennel, and brought them to such a degree of tameness, as an animal so savage by nature can be capable of acquiring...” (Swift, 295). This passage becomes very clear that Yahoos are similar to beings. Works Cited Bloom, Harold. Christina Rossetti. London: Chelsea House Publishers, 2004. Print. Lemke, Donald B., Cynthia Martin, Benny Fuentes, and Jonathan Swift. Jonathan Swifts Gullivers travels. London: Stone Arch Books, 2008. Print. Wiener, Gary. Readings on Gullivers travels. New York: Greenhaven Press, 2000. Print. Woodside, Martin, Jamel Akib, and Jonathan Swift. Gullivers travels. New York: Sterling Pub., 2006. Print. Read More