Think about, and be prepared to discuss five of the following questions. Check any words you don't understand in a dictionary or glossary of literary terms.

1. Identify some of the customs of Houyhnhnm society.  How, for example, do the Houyhnhnms deal with the death of a loved one?  What kinds of poetry and song exist among the Houhynhynms?

2. In what ways is Gulliver like and unlike a Yahoo?

3. Should we aspire (as Gulliver does at the end of the book) to become as like the rational Houyhynhynms as possible? What might we gain if we did so? What would we lose?

4. What literary and rhetorical strategies does Swift use to undermine or satirise a particular value or practice (for example colonialism, militarism/war, the law, religious dogma)?

5. Do you trust Gulliver as a narrator? In what ways does Swift provide an ironic perspective on his hero?

 6. How does Gulliver characterise imperialism and colonialism?