Question

Explain how Jonathan Swift alters the format to set off certain information in Part IV of Gulliver’s Travels. Provide an example from the text.

Answer 1

On Part IV of Gulliver’s Travels Johnathan Swift changes from fictional literature to non-fictional literature. To do so, he talks about the human nature in a first-person “The reader may please to observe that the following extract of the many conversations I had with my master, contains a summary of the most material points, which were discoursed at several times for above two years”.

So basically he changes from the main story of the book, which is the travels of Gulliver, to talk about human nature.

Answer 2

Possible answer:



Responses may vary but should include some or all of the following information:
Part IV of Gulliver’s Travels is much more nonfiction than fiction in nature. Swift wants to educate his readers about the pitfalls of human nature, and he does not have much time for any sort of plot or characterization messing up that purpose. In chapter 5 of Part IV, Swift alters his format to set off all this information about human nature with the following: “The reader may please to observe that the following extract of the many conversations I had with my master, contains a summary of the most material points, which were discoursed at several times for above two years . . . .” In this portion of Part IV, Swift is deciding to deviate from the travel narrative pattern he has set up from the beginning of the book. Although travel narratives aren’t set up like novels, they are more story-like than nonfiction-like, so Swift needs to indicate with some sort of paragraph (like the one here) that he is choosing to deviate from his preset format. This technique is a sign post for the reader, designed to help alleviate confusion.