To what extent is Lemuel Gulliver in Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift a reflection of the writer with regard to political and religious views, and attitudes toward women and the concept of family?

This extended essay is an examination of the extent to which the protagonist Lemuel Gulliver in Gulliver’s Travels is a reflection of Jonathan Swift. It involves the exploration of this research question in terms of politics, religion, attitude to women and family; with references to this piece of literature and some secondary resources when necessary. The quotations from published literary criticism are either refuted by examples from the novel or supported in the light of evidence from the novel. Other secondary resources include Swift’s two other prose works, The Modest Proposal and A Letter to a Very Young Lady on Her Marriage, which are referred to briefly for clarification of the evidence. The purpose of this study is to analyse in what ways and to what extent the protagonist is an author-surrogate in the abovementioned ways. This essay is comprised of two sections, namely “politics and religion” and “women and family”, each focusing on a particular aspect of the investigation. In the first section, Swift’s political and religious standpoint is discussed extensively in order to correctly evaluate Gulliver’s paradigm. By making connections between the beliefs of the author and those of Gulliver, the relation between the two is established to support the claim of this essay. In the second section, the female figures in the novel and Gulliver’s perception of them are inspected. The plot is also taken into consideration in this part of the inquiry although the central focus is on the persona. In the conclusion, it is validated that Gulliver is a reflection of Jonathan Swift with regard to political and religious vision, and attitude towards women and family, by juxtaposing and assembling the main elements of personification of Gulliver and Jonathan Swift’s personal ideas and experiences