On 5th November 1699 the Merchant Ship Antelope foundered on a rock in the Latitude of 30 Degrees 2 minutes South. The only survivor of the crew was the ships physician Lemuel Gulliver who some hours later awoke bound on a beach in the Empire of Lilliput. On 31st August 1997 Gullivers direct (although unwitting) descendent was being driven back from a conference in Paris when going through an underpass his vehicle was struck with great force from behind. Rendered unconscious he was next aware of being thrown from a helicopter into a shallow sea from whence he waded ashore. On awaking next morning he finds himself bound & being addressed by tiny figures welcoming him to... Lilliput. Jonathan Swifts classic satire about little people big people crazy scientists & rational horses has not only gripped our imaginations for nearly 300 years; its also one of the greatest
- while also most humane
- indictments of humanity ever written. Now the award winning cartoonist & writer Martin Rowson has followed Swifts heros descendent as quite by chance he finds himself visiting the same places three centuries later. Thus the Modern Gulliver learns how history has unfolded for the Lilliputians while discovering the secrets of New Lilliputs economic boom & accidentally precipitating its crash. He finds out how the giants of Brobdingnag were inspired to transform their way of life by his ancestors example of being one of the most pernicious Race of little odious vermin that Nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the Earth. Gullivers Travels adapted & updated by Martin Rowson is both a homage to the original & an entirely up-to-date indictment of the same enduring human idiocies that enraged Swift so magnificently & memorably in the first place.""