Gulliver's Travels

The narrative begins with the narrator, Lemuel Gulliver, describing his childhood and the events that led him to become a seaman. He tells the reader that he is the third of five sons and that he was sent to a Puritan college at the age of fourteen. Afterwards he became an apprentice to a surgeon in London, during which time he also learned about navigation and mathematics in preparation for a future on the sea, "as I always believed it would be some time or other my fortune to do." Next he studied "Physick" (medicine) because he thought it would be "useful in long Voyages."

Afterwards Gulliver married Mrs. Mary Burton and began his life as a surgeon, taking on several patients. When his business begins to fail, he takes a six-year trip to the sea, where he serves as the surgeon to two ships and travels the East and West Indies.