Compare and Contrast the Narrators in Gullivers Travels...

Compare and contrast the narrators in Gulliver’s Travels and Frankenstein, the narrative methods, and the effects of these different ways of telling a story in Gulliver’s Travels and Frankenstein. Ravee Chen S2 English H Dr.Freisen 8 April 2010 Word count: 1491 Why do authors use different types of narrators? Jonathan Swift and Mary Shelly have both chosen a first-person narrator in their novels Gulliver’s Travels and Frankenstein. In Gulliver’s Travels the narrator is Gulliver and the book is a personal account of four voyages to unexplored lands around the globe. In the first voyage he winds up in Littleput where everyone is tiny. During his second trip he is taken to a land of giants called†¦show more content†¦In fact, in response to the King’s refusal Gulliver exclaims, â€Å"A strange Effect of narrow Principles and short Views!†(Swift 124) The values and ideology of imperial England are too deeply ingrained in Gulliver which causes bias that distances the reader. In book 4 when Gulliver first encounters the Houyhnhnms, rational and philosophical horses with near human intelligence, he says, â€Å"they must needs be Magicians.†(Swift 218) This wild statement proves that Gulliver, by bo ok 4, has become an unreliable narrator comparable to Frankenstein. His absurd and irrational way of thinking causes the reader is to be completely distanced from Gulliver. This mirrors the author-narrator gap that Jonathan Swift stated in the beginning of the book by labelling â€Å"Le’Muel Gulliver† as the author not himself. Gulliver’s love for travel transforms him into a man who rejects humanity and is repulsed by even his own family and Frankenstein is changed into a madman by his scientific endeavours. A single narrator is used by Jonathan Swift in to highlight the decline of one man. If multiple narrators were used in this novel then his satire would be weaker since we would get many perspectives on the same event and the reader would not align themselves with a single narrator’s perspective. This single mindedness strengthens the satire. The telling of Gulliver’s Travels through a first person narrative allows enhances the satire of the European society and