Passion And Rationality In A Streetcar Named Desire

Swift however, does not intend us to emulate either Yahoo or Houyhnhnm behavior, but rather to take the positive aspects which each portray, and dilute them into a compromise that befits the healthy functioning of a human being. Williams agrees that Swift is creating a novel whose moral is to say, “Passions and affections, carefully guided, are treated as necessary in creatures who are imperfect and interdependent” (Williams 286), and likewise the “Houyhnhnms, far from being a model of perfection, are intended to show the inadequacy of the life of reason” (Williams 277). A being embodying such a balance of passion and rationality is introduced in the form of Captain Pedro de Mendez, who “illustrates the error of viewing man as split between passions that deserve to be exterminated and abstract reason” (Nichols 1167). As the captain …show more content…
This may seem obvious to the reader, because de Mendez is indeed not a Yahoo, although Gulliver continues to regard himself as superior to the Yahoo which he perceives de Mendez to be. There are instances in which Gulliver condescends to speak to de Mendez as a somewhat rational being such as when he responds to de Mendez’ earnest questioning about Gulliver’s attempt to jump ship. Gulliver describes this instance as one where he “descended to treat him like an animal which had some little portion of reason.”(Swift De Mendez further displays his embodiment of passion when he acts in contrast to the Houyhnhnms’ rational decision to cast Gulliver off of the island due to him neither fitting into the Houyhnhnm world, nor being trusted amongst the Yahoos due to his superior intelligence. De Mendez recognizes Gulliver as one who fits in with his own species, and takes him in without regard to how behaviorally inhuman he has