- Struldbrug
In
Jonathan Swift 's novel "Gulliver's Travels ", the name Struldbrug is given to those humans who are born seemingly normal, but are in fact immortal. However, although struldbrugs do not "die", they do nonetheless continue "aging ". Swift's work depicts the evil of immortality without eternal youth.They are easily recognized by a red dot above their left eyebrow. They are normal human beings until they reach the age of thirty, at which time they become dejected. Upon reaching the age of eighty they become legally dead, and suffer from many ailments including the loss of eyesight and the loss of hair.
Struldbrugs were forbidden to own property:
As soon as they have completed the term of eighty years, they are looked on as dead in law; their heirs immediately succeed to their estates; only a small pittance is reserved for their support; and the poor ones are maintained at the public charge. After that period, they are held incapable of any employment of trust or profit; they cannot purchase lands, or take leases; neither are they allowed to be witnesses in any cause, either civil or criminal, not even for the decision of meers and bounds.
Because:
Otherwise, as avarice is the necessaryconsequence of old age, those immortals would in time becomeproprietors of the whole nation, and engross the civil power,which, for want of abilities to manage, must end in the ruin of thepublic.
Related myths
Incidentally, Chinese
Taoism placed the Island of the Immortals eastward from China, while Swift places the Struldbrugs near Japan.The term "struldbrug" has often been used in
science fiction , most prolifically byLarry Niven , to describesupercentenarian s.ee also
*
Brobdingnag
*Lilliput and Blefuscu
*Houyhnhnm
*Yahoo (Gulliver's Travels)
*Tithonus External links
* [http://classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/jswift/bl-jswift-gull-3-10.htm Gulliver's Travels - Part 3, Chapter 10]
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