Humour in More's Utopia and Swift's Gulliver's Travels

Thomas More's Utopia influenced Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels greatly. The closeness of the two books is indicated by, for example, Turner's notes for his edition of Gulliver's Travels. But the two books differ much in form and type of narrative. Utopia might be insipid for indifferent readers who are not so accustomed to such discourse. Gulliver's Travels is interesting for any readers because of various methods of satire in the narrative. The difference is indicated, for example, in the accounts of military affairs. To understand these books, it is important to see beyond differences and to reconsider the common spirit of criticism of human society and how humour disguises severe criticism of human nature. The names of the two fictional characters Hythloday and Gulliver share the spirit of humour that is common in the two books. Thomas More, indicating that his sense of humour is intelligible only to the learned reader, invents the character Hythloday, expert of nonsense. More jokingly denies that the book is a fiction and insists on its veracity in his second letter to Giles. More mentions proper nouns such as Anydrus and Utopia, obvious coinages of More's, as proofs of the reality in the narrative. Similarly, Jonathan Swift invents Gulliver, the character and supposed author of the Travels. Gulliver, Splendide Mendax (magnificent liar), is not only 'gullible' himself, but also may deceive the reader. Since both More and Swift appear to be the 'doubles' of the characters Hythloday and Gulliver, readers cannot decide which is lying, More or Hythloday, Swift or Gulliver.

公開日:2010年1月24日で登録したコンテンツは、国立情報学研究所において電子化したものです。