A Comparison Of Ideal Societies Between Utopia And Gulliver's Travels

Utopia is the name of an isolated place where there was an ideal society described by Thomas More in his book Utopia. Gulliver's Travels is an entertaining book for people of all ages, underlying which is a pungent satire that Jonathan Swift used to slash at his contemporary society. This thesis examines the relationship between Utopia and Gulliver's Travels mainly in the perspective of the ideal society. Its main part attempts an unprecedented comparison by confining its scope to these two books from the following angles: geographical position, reward and punishment, law, the Utopian way of death, sex and reproduction, education, power and property. First in this thesis is included a brief introduction of the two writers, i.e. Thomas More and Jonathan Swift. Afterwards the definition of Utopia has been discussed, examining alternative ideal societies, which provide different solutions to the collective problem, namely, a paucity of material and spiritual satisfactions weakly coordinated with the desires and aspirations of a community of individuals. The sources on which the two books drew have also been identified with a focus on classical mythology, Christian doctrines, Greek philosophy and influences of Swift's contemporary writers.