After the Journey Essay

Steve Clark, who wrote â€Å"Travel Writing and Empire† believes that â€Å"the traveller is altered, sometimes changed utterly† when he or she journeys in an unfamiliar environment; some stories from real life do prove this statement.   There are also well-known fictional travellers who can show how significant and life-changing journeys can be, and this is where we focus.   However, before dealing with these characters, imagine travelling to foreign countries, immersing in other cultures, and either fighting against or indulging in the new experiences.   These experiences, negative or positive, become part of the traveller’s life, however little the effect may appear. Robinson Crusoe’s wanderlust has led him to an experience that he has never thought possible.   All he has longed for is a taste of adventure, but what he has to give in exchange for this adventure is practically his whole life.   Meanwhile, Lemuel Gulliver only wants to relate his travels to other people. He professes that â€Å"I rather chose to relate plain matter of fact in the simplest manner and style, because my principal design was to inform, and not to amuse thee.† (Swift, 1962)   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   â€Å"Robinson Crusoe’s† plot begins with disobedience.     Both Robinson Crusoe’s parents have opposed his desire to go on a voyage. â€Å"He asked me what reasons, more than a mere wandering inclination, I had for leaving father’s house and my native country, where I might be well introduced, and had a prospect of raising my fortune by application and industry, with a life of ease and pleasure†. (Defoe)   Crusoe is reminded by his father that he does not need to seek his fortune or win honour of some kind.   His later wretched condition reminds him of his father’s warnings. â€Å"Robinson Crusoe† is believed to be based on the life of Alexander Selkirk who has run away to sea in 1704.   He has made a request to be left alone in an uninhabited island before being rescued after five years. (Bibliomania) Crusoe’s experience is of course more imaginative and more complex, as Daniel Defoe adds in more adventures for the castaway. Although Crusoe’s situation is not contrived like Selkirk’s, who has clearly requested to be left alone, his strong desire to continue setting out to sea even after a perilous first voyage has led him to a similar fate.   Surviving the first voyage, Robinson Crusoe has continued his adventures and has ended up living in an uninhabited island alone. Crusoe has started the voyage as an inexperienced young man who has lived in comfort; he cannot have gone through his voyages without being changed in some manner.   Crusoe’s love for travel is undeniable.   He has risked not only a secure livelihood in order to pursue the adventure, but also his life.   As a person, he already does not conform to what the society expects of him.   Nevertheless, the castaway experience is still extreme even to an adventurer. Crusoe has to do things that he wouldn’t normally do given his former comfortable lifestyle.   A man who has not been trained to practice a trade, he has learned to create necessary tools and gear ranging from clay containers and clothes, to even a canoe. He has become very self-sufficient and resourceful as needed by the situation.   His daily experiences also range from peaceful inventions to discovering cannibals, saving a native whom he has named â€Å"Friday† and has even earned himself a fortune.   These experiences themselves can affirm that Robinson Crusoe is not the same man who has left his home for the first time.   Robinson Crusoe, who has been expected to live comfortably and without much risk, has proven himself to be capable of seeking his fortune on his own.   He not only changes himself in the process, but he also changes the perceptions of what a person must or must not do in society. Through his example, people are able to see that it can be profitable, although difficult, to go outside of the box that people of Crusoe’s time seem to have locked themselves in.   Crusoe experiences changes in his attitude towards religion.   Even though there is no longer a physical church to attend a mass in, it is in his solitude and with a Bible in hand that he is able to commune with God and nature.    Some critics have noted this as a sign that â€Å"Robinson Crusoe† is a morality story which begins with disobedience and results to conversion. (The Development of the Novel)   What cannot be changed in Crusoe, however, is his humanity.   Humans still long for the company of other human beings.   He does meet and obtain the companionship of the native, Friday, but he is unused to the other man’s culture.   Crusoe later develops a more open-minded attitude towards other cultures because of his immersion into their worlds.   He even tries to understand the cannibalistic ways of the natives. Now, we look at â€Å"Gulliver’s Travels.†Ã‚   Gulliver’s adventures are more fantastical than Crusoe’s.   He encounters little people and giants, and other strange communities.   There must be a change in Gulliver after years of travelling to such places.   In fact, Gulliver has to adapt in each of the four places that he visits. Like Crusoe’s first voyage, Gulliver’s first venture is met with dangerous weather.   This results to his being shipwrecked in Lilliput, where he describes the people to be less than six inches tall. (Swift, 1962)   Gulliver has to convince the Lilliputians that he is harmless.   He later gains their trust and has become the community hero, having been able to help the little people against their rival, the Blefescudans. Gulliver no longer wants to comply with the Lilliputians’ further demands and has to flee to save his life.   After his stay in Lilliput, his numerous adventures include an encounter with giants who make him feel like a Lilliputian, and meeting horses who rule over Yahoos, who are uncivilized human beings. During the various encounters, Gulliver is introduced to different kinds of civilisations.   His understanding of what an empire is broadens, as he encounters the various kinds of kingdoms, with their unique beliefs and practices.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   â€Å"Gulliver’s Travels† is tagged as a satire; Critics believe in the need to study Jonathan Swift’s background in order to fully understand the historical context in which he is writing the novel.   Swift is reported to have prior political influence, when he was still supporting the Whig Party.   He shifts his alliance to the Tory Party upon hearing that the Whig Party is opposed to the Anglican Church.   When the Whig Party gains more influence, Swift loses his.   This is believed to have caused Swift’s hostility against the government in London. (Glasgow University Library)   The different characters within the various communities Gulliver encounters in the story are said to be based on real political figures. Lemuel Gulliver is altered by his many adventures.   He has learned that there is not just one type of community for which the others are based.   For each new place, he has to adapt in order to fit into the norm.   Each adaptation is a change in Gulliver.   In fact, his immersion into the world of Houyhnhnms, which are horse-like creatures, has even created a dislike for humans in him.   Gulliver has to re-accustom himself to life with ordinary people when he goes home. â€Å"My wife and family received me with great surprise and joy, because they concluded me certainly dead; but I must freely confess the sight of them filled me only with hatred, disgust, and contempt; and the more, by reflecting on the near alliance I had to them†. (Swift, 1962) This is proof enough that journeys can totally alter the traveller, as is with Gulliver who not only changes a bit but drastically. â€Å"It is easy for us who travel into remote countries, which are seldom visited by Englishmen or other Europeans, to form descriptions of wonderful animals both at sea and land. Whereas a traveller’s chief aim should be to make men wiser and better, and to improve their minds by the bad, as well as good, example of what they deliver concerning foreign places.† (Swift, 1962) The above declaration by Gulliver signifies his belief that the traveller can effect a change in how other people think.   Even in real societies, people who have experience living in, or visiting foreign places come back with new beliefs that either blend with or completely erase their old ones.   They may not be completely different people, because Robinson Crusoe still longs for the company of fellowmen, but there are definite changes.   Each experience in life leaves indelible marks in the person who goes through it. Moreover, Gulliver has to undergo an adjustment period after being almost chameleon-like in his adjustments in different civilisations.   Robinson Crusoe has to transition from his comfortable and secure life to a life that is at times spent in solitude and sometimes spent in danger.   He also becomes better in touch with his spiritual side, while becoming a person who can survive anywhere.   It can be then concluded that the two classic novels, â€Å"Gulliver’s Travels† and â€Å"Robinson Crusoe† support Steve Clark’s idea that journeying into unfamiliar territory will alter or change the traveller completely. References Bibliomania. (n.d.). Retrieved October 18, 2007, from Bibliomania: Free Online Literature and Study Guides: http://www.bibliomania.com/0/0/17/31/frameset.html Defoe, D. (n.d.). Robinson Crusoe. Retrieved October 17, 2007, from Dead Men Tell No Tales: http://www.deadmentellnotales.com/onlinetexts/robinson/crusoe.shtml Glasgow University Library. (n.d.). Special Collections Department. Retrieved October 18, 2007, from http://special.lib.gla.ac.uk/exhibns/month/jan2006.html Swift, J. (1962). Gulliver’s Travels and Other Writings. (M. K. Starkman, Ed.) New York: Bantam Books. The Development of the Novel. (n.d.). Retrieved October 18, 2007, from University of St. Andrews: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~cjmm/Crusoelec.html