Gulliver's Travels is a satirical novel written by Jonathan Swift in the early 1700's. It tells the story of Lemuel Gulliver, who sets off on four journeys, each of which reflects some aspect of the English society that Jonathan Swift was a part of and wanted to comment on. It explores themes such as the misuse of power, the individual's place in a larger society, and the idea of colonization.
Pedro de Mendez is the name of the Portuguese captain who rescues Gulliver in Book IV. When Gulliver is forced to leave the Island of the Houyhnhnms, his plan is "to discover some small Island uninhabited" where he can live in solitude. Instead, he is picked up by Don Pedro's crew. Despite Gulliver's appearance—he is dressed in skins and speaks like a horse—Don Pedro treats him compassionately and returns him to Lisbon.
Though Don Pedro appears only briefly, he has become an important figure in the debate between so-called soft school and hard school readers of Gulliver's Travels . Soft school critics contend that Gulliver is a target of Swift's satire and that Don Pedro represents an ideal of human kindness and generosity. For hard-school critics, Gulliver sees the bleak fallenness at the center of human nature, and Don Pedro is merely a minor character who, in Gulliver's words, is "an Animal which had some little Portion of Reason."
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