The Story of Gulliver

The disconcerting encounters of Lemuel Gulliver

For the first time in his life, Gulliver felt ashamed of himself and his fellow-humans.

Gulliver is a travel-hungry and adventurous ship's doctor, who has the odd misfortune of being ship-wrecked four times in as many voyages. Through Jonathan Coe's expert retelling of Swift's famous satire about our human hubris and desires, today's young readers are swept along as Gulliver finds himself a giant among tiny humans in Lilliput; a tiny human among giants in Brobdignag; on the flying island of Laputa, with its most impractical intellectuals; and finally in the land of the Houyhnhnms, talking horses who think precious little of human Yahoos.

Jonathan Coe was born a long time ago in England, where he still lives. He has written twelve books, among them The House of Sleep and The Rain Before it Falls, but knows that he will never write as beautiful a book as Gulliver's Travels.