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Houyhnhnms as Ideal in Gulliver's Travels ?
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- Mon Nov 01 2004

... Houyhnhnms as Ideal in Gulliver's Travels ? One of the most interesting questions about Gulliver's Travels is whether the Houyhnhnms represent an ideal of rationality or whether they are the butt of Swift's satire. In other words, in Book IV, is Swift poking fun at the talking horses or does he intend for us to take them seriously as the proper way to act? If we look closely at the way that the Houyhnhnms act, we can see that in fact Swift does not take them seriously: he uses them to show the dangers of pride. To create his satire, Swift uses the character of Gulliver and the pride of knowledge, courtship and self-aggrandizement of the Houyhnhnms. First we have to see that Swift does not even take Gulliver seriously. For instance, his name sounds much like gullible, which suggests that he will believe anything. Also, when he first













