Study Questions

1. Why does Gulliver visit Glubbdubdrib?

2. What kind of place is it?

3. Who are the Governor’s servants in Glubbdubdrib?

4. What is Gulliver allowed to do in Glubbdubdrib?

5. Who are some of the famous people Gulliver sees in Glubbdubdrib?

6. What does Gulliver learn from the philosophers there?

7. What does Gulliver learn about kings and rulers there?

8. Who are the sympathetic figures in Glubbdubdrib?

9. What does Gulliver have to do in the Court of Luggnag?

10. How are people sometimes punished there?

Answers

1. Gulliver visits Glubbdubdrib because he is delayed on the way to Luggnag.

2. Glubbdubdrib is a country of magicians.

3. The Governor’s servants are ghosts.

4. Gulliver is allowed to call up the ghosts of whomever he pleases and ask them questions.

5. In Glubbdubdrib, Gulliver sees the ghosts of many famous people, including Homer, Aristotle, and Roman Emperors.

6. Gulliver learns from the philosophers at Glubbdubdrib (or rather from their ghosts) that commentators have misinter¬pret¬ed their writings.

7. Gulliver learns that kings and rulers are corrupt, and were usually of humble origin a few generations back.

8. The sympathetic figures among the ghosts in Glubbdubdrib are the destroyers of tyrants and usurpers, the restorers of liberty to their people, and the old, honest, sincere English yeomen (small farmers).

9. In the Court of Luggnag, Gulliver has to lick the dust before the King’s footstool.

10. In Luggnag, people are sometimes punished by having the dust they lick poisoned.