Who is Lemuel Gulliver in Gulliver’s Travels?

In the novel Gulliver’s Travels (1726) by the Anglo-Irish author Jonathan Swift, Lemuel Gulliver serves as the narrator and protagonist. He is a surgeon and sea captain who embarks on four separate voyages to remote, fantastical regions of the world.123

Throughout his adventures, Gulliver encounters various societies—such as the tiny Lilliputians, the giants of Brobdingnag, the scientists of Laputa, and the rational Houyhnhnms—which Swift uses to satirize human follies and 18th-century English customs. By the end of his travels, Gulliver’s experiences, particularly his interaction with the brutish Yahoos and the virtuous Houyhnhnms, leave him deeply disillusioned with humanity, leading him to reject his own society upon his return to England.123