Isaac Newton on Laputa
Irked by both his character and his tendency towards corruption, Jonathan Swift spent years ruthlessly satirising Isaac Newton.
Marooned on a remote island, Captain Lemuel Gulliver gloomily pondered his fate after spending a sleepless night huddled in a cave for shelter. Suddenly, the sky darkened. Looking up, his spirits lifted when he saw a large shiny object tacking through the sky. Before long he had been winched up into the miniature realm of Laputa, a flying magnetic island.
When he reported his experiences aboard this bizarre craft, Gulliver began by commenting on some ornately robed men who were so absorbed in their philosophical speculations that they were accompanied by ‘Flappers’, personal attendants who periodically retrieved their attention by tapping them with a rattle. According to Sir Walter Scott, Jonathan Swift’s friends were able to pinpoint the source of this inspiration: ‘the habitual absence of mind of the great philosopher’ Isaac Newton.
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