How is utopia a renaissance work

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Don't waste time. Let our experts help you. Hire verified expert. By continuing you agree to our cookie policy. HIRE Writer. The utopian societies described — without exception — develop systems aiming toward equality and justice. Equality is attained in nearly every instance through community of property and the elimination of money, also through equitable sharing of labor, community rearing of children, and often community dining.

Plain, uniform clothing is usually prescribed, and any kind of luxury or ostentation is discouraged, Bacon's New Atlantis excepted. The governments are made up of carefully selected elders of demonstrated character and competence. Variations appear in connection with the question of community of women, proposed by Plato but rejected by More. Campanella and some later writers follow Plato but most follow More. The acceptance of slavery in the community, approved by both Plato and More, is not adopted by their followers.

The history of utopian literature from the mid-seventeenth century to the present cannot be treated in detail here, since there are more than 50 works that ought to be included in such a study.

A brief survey will have to suffice for present purposes. A few of the better known and more influential works will be analyzed briefly and classified according to the main directions of development of the theme.

Denis Diderot's Supplement to Bougainville's "Voyage" is a prime example of the eighteenth-century vogue of primitivism which was spurred by Rousseau's thesis of the "noble savage" and which generated such novels as St.

Pierre's Paul and Virginia and Chateaubriand's Atala. Diderot's book makes a case for the simple, natural ways of a South Sea Island culture as reported by Bougainville, a French explorer. The central portion of the story presents an imaginary dialogue between a French chaplain and a native of Tahiti Orou in which a comparison is made between the customs and institutions of Europe and those of Tahiti.

The way of life of the islanders is eloquently defended, and that of the Europeans discredited. According to the Tahitian, man's natural instincts, which are equated with the laws of nature, are interpreted as justifying complete freedom in sexual relations. Their observance of community property is defended as minimizing personal conflicts and legal entanglements and promoting a general concern for the welfare of the community as a whole. Unlike most of the earlier utopian documents, Diderot's presents an account of a place on the map and its existing society.

The report is secondhand and is colored by the imagination of a philosophical primitivist. The exploration of a South Sea utopian commonwealth is of limited scope because of the author's overriding preoccupation with the sexual relations of the natives, leaving almost entirely unexplained such concerns as governmental organization, legal system, distribution of labor, and methods of warfare.

Regarding the economy, we are simply told that there is no private property. Looking Backward by Edward Bellamy, the most successful and influential American author writing in the utopian vein, presents a vision of a glorious future society. Julian West, a young, aristocratic Bostonian, falls asleep under a hypnotic trance in , but through a remarkable set of circumstances, is awakened in the year His host family in this new age introduces him to their amazing society, explaining their institutions and the rationale for their system.

The new Boston of , Julian West discovers, is a city of beauty and grace, with many splendid public buildings, reflecting an undreamed of prosperity; but, more important, it is populated by people who are remarkably healthy and happy. The basic reason for these conditions is that equality has been attained throughout the population. There are no more rich, no more poor.

The first lesson West learns is that all industry and all institutions are under the control of the national government, a system which, he is informed, has proved to be far more effective than the earlier one of free, private enterprise because of the elimination of wasteful competition. These enormous nationwide political and industrial institutions are structured on the plan of a military organization.

Money has been outlawed, but a substitute means of transacting personal business has been devised. Every individual is given a monthly allowance in the form of a credit card, a kind of punch card, to record his expenditures. This method permits individuals to exercise judgment and taste in the way they like to live. Some will set a better table than others, some acquire a larger house, some will travel extensively, but everyone's allowance is the same.

The extraordinary efficiency of the entire business structure is explained in part by superior management, as has been said, but also partly because they have eliminated several costly and time-consuming activities, freeing the citizens for more productive work.

There is no army, no navy, no police force; there are no lawyers, bankers, or salesmen. Education is regarded as important and is continued to age 21 for all citizens. During their years of schooling, the pupils are introduced to many trades, professions, and arts in order to discover where their talents and interests lie, to enable them to choose the vocation that will bring them the greatest satisfaction in their adult years.

At age 21, everyone enters the work force, "the industrial army," where he or she will serve up to the age of Women and men are treated equally with respect to education, career in the work force, compensation. There is some distinction made regarding the occupations of men and women, and there are provisions for pregnancy. Bellamy's optimism for the future of mankind is further revealed in his confidence that human ingenuity will continue to contribute inventions for comfort and convenience of mankind.

Specifically, he predicts that there will be canopied sidewalks for the protection of pedestrians, and he describes piped-in home entertainment obtained by merely pressing buttons and turning knobs for sermons, lectures, or a wide selection of musical programs. He does not develop this aspect of modern living at length, his preoccupation being in the fields of economics and sociology; but he is clearly not in the camp of those later writers who fear the further advances of technology. The study of human society as foreseen by Bellamy is contrasted at every turn with the institutions, customs, and mores of the late nineteenth century.

Actually, more than half of the space in the book is devoted to the analysis of Bellamy's own time, which is a scathing denunciation of that society, often in eloquent language. In William Morris's News from Nowhere first published in serial form in , then in book form in , the author, well known for his involvement in the Pre-Raphaelite movement and for the establishment of the Kelmscott Press, offers his vision of a bright future for England.

The narrator of the novel goes to bed in his home in a London suburb one night in , but when he wakes he finds himself in strange surroundings. The people he meets talk about events that occurred in the year as though they were past history. Radical changes have transformed England both in appearance and in its social patterns.

The new society is structured according to the pattern of ideal communism: no money, no private property, perfect equality for every citizen. Labor is shared by every member of the community. These are all familiar attributes of utopian societies. One of the distinctive features of Morris's plan is that labor is regarded as a pleasure rather than a necessary chore, the reason being that everyone works at a task that he can do best and consequently takes pride in the product of his labor.

This essentially Medieval attitude toward the achievement of the workman turns production into something of an art, whether the product is a dish, a meal, a doorknob, or a bridge.

The revival of that ancient pattern of individual workmanship has been made possible by the elimination of all but the simplest machinery. Factories have all been destroyed, and the former pattern of urban industrial crowding and squalor has disappeared.

Where London used to be there is a collection of scattered villages. The age is described as post-industrial. The story of the transformation from the nineteenth-century capitalist-industrial society is explained to the narrator by an old man who has made a study of the revolution that brought about the change.

Before the outbreak of armed revolt, conditions for the common workers grew gradually more intolerable, and unions banded together in an organization similar to the AFL-CIO. The establishment ordered the machine-gunning of unarmed protesters, and the people finally learned how to fight back. Certain features of this history are reminiscent of the French Revolution, but others actually foreshadow developments and actions which occurred in the twentieth century, like the firing into the crowd of protesters in Petrograd by the Czarist guards.

Morris's utopia is the natural outgrowth of his lifelong devotion to two causes: first, his Pre-Raphaelite conviction that the workman of Medieval times was a happy man and a fulfilled artist, and second, his political involvement in the Socialist movement. Morris, like Bellamy, predicts a brighter future for mankind, with men and women equal, healthy, and happy; but he differs radically in his discarding of "modernity" with its advancing technology and complex organization.

Wells devotes much of his attention to previews of possible future developments of civilization that are predominantly optimistic. It is utopian specifically in that Wells held a firm belief in the progress of mankind toward perfection; hence, he confidently pictured a bright future.

The term "modern" in the title was meant to convey the idea that he intended to keep his picture within the realm of reasonable possibility, avoiding excessively visionary treatment of the theme.

For that reason he was unwilling to adopt certain features that were traditional among the majority of earlier utopists. The great society of the future, he believes, will have a worldwide structure, a World State. Nationalities will no longer have significance. The entire human race will become one commonwealth with uniform customs and mores and with a common language. Money will still be used for exchange, and individuals will still hold the right to ownership of personal property, though all of the earth's land and all sources of power will belong to the State — that is, to everyone.

He does not subscribe to the idea that all work can be made pleasurable; consequently, he declares that every member of society shall be required to perform work up to a minimum which earns him enough to discharge his obligations.

Beyond that, he may choose to work more to earn more or he is free to enjoy his leisure. Equality for all mankind is not a realistic goal in Wells's view. That, he believes, would mean a loss of individuality, and individuality is an inherent requirement of human nature. Similarly, competition is necessary to a thriving society. Taking what he considers a practical position, he sees the new society as divided into four classes of persons which he calls poietic, kinetic, dull, and base.

There is a leader caste, called Samurai, which is drawn primarily from the poietic group, though some from the kinetic class may qualify. Persons who volunteer for Samurai membership must meet stringent requirements, both physical and mental; and they must pledge to conform to the rules of the caste, which forbid eating meat, smoking, drinking, gambling, and participation in public sports or entertainments.

The Samurai furnish the World State with its administrators, legislators, lawyers, doctors, and other leaders. Furthermore, they are the only voters in the commonwealth. The male members of the Samurai are encouraged to marry women of comparable qualifications, and they are encouraged to produce children with the aim of improving the quality of the population. The lower classes of citizens, the dull witted, the criminals, and the deformed are exiled from society and prevented from childbearing.

The religion of Utopia is based on moral and humanitarian principles but is free from superstitions and formal ceremonies. Its primary tenet is the denial of the doctrine of original sin. The affirmation of man's inherent goodness is inherent in the pervading optimism of the work.

The optimistic views which the author held regarding the inevitable progress of human society were somewhat undermined by the events of World War I, as is demonstrated in his later writings. He came to question whether or not scientific progress would always achieve social improvement. His warning of the possibility of developing mind control through blatant advertising and through drugs is prophetic. A body of writings commonly associated with the utopian tradition even though the works seem to be in direct contradiction are variously referred to as anti-utopian or distopian.

If it is remembered that the primary motivation for all utopian writing is a desire to attack the ills of existing society and to point directions for the amelioration of human society, we will recognize that these anti-utopian documents are not entirely remote from the traditional utopias. Indeed, the anti-utopian works purport to offer utopian solutions to social, economic, and political problems at the outset, but sooner or later — usually sooner — the reader discovers that the author's real purpose is satirical.

The title of Samuel Butler's Erewhon is intended as an anagram for "Nowhere"; and that, it is recalled, is the translation of "Utopia. Erewhon is a remote kingdom not on any map, which the narrator claims to have discovered in his travels. Much of the landscape resembles a region of New Zealand where Butler had lived for a few years. The residents of Erewhon are without contact with any other nation and live according to their own eccentric pattern of civilization.

In many respects their life resembles that of contemporary Western civilization rather than Plato's or More's plan of society. They are governed by a monarchy, and have lawyers, judges, and prisons.

They have money, banks, rich citizens, and poor. The features of Erewhonian society that surprise the author are those that differ from the England that he knew. According to the early impressions of the travelers, the people all appear to be exceptionally healthy, exceedingly handsome, and altogether contented.

Their life style is characterized by simplicity and gracious manners, best described as Arcadian. Gradually, however, oddities, or what appear to be oddities to the visitor, begin to surface. Duplicity pervades every aspect of thought and action. The natives habitually profess agreement to a proposition although they do not believe in it, and their friends are perfectly aware that they do not mean what they say.

There are two separate banking systems in operation and two sets of religions. The people give lip service to what they call the Musical Banks, but they transact all serious business with the currency of the other chain of banks. Similarly they recognize a group of deities representing the personification of human qualities — justice, hope, love, fear — and erect statues to them; but their pragmatic morality is evidently dictated by a goddess — Ydgrun Grundy. More and more they reveal themselves to the traveler as victims of self-deception and inverted logic.

Their universities are called Colleges of Unreason, and the principal course of study is Hypothetics. One of the most eccentric features of Erewhonian life is the interpretation of crime and punishment. Illness is treated as a crime. Sentences of varying degrees of severity are pronounced according to the nature and seriousness of the disease.

There are no physicians in the country. Those actions which Europeans consider criminal — theft, fraud, embezzlement — are regarded as weaknesses of character deserving sympathy and help, help which is provided through the ministrations of "straighteners.

Another surprising feature is the attitude toward machinery. Several centuries earlier, the Erewhonians had attained a remarkable stage of sophistication in the development of machinery, but through the teachings of a prophet they had been persuaded that machines might some day become masters over men, with the result that they destroyed all of the machinery having any degree of complexity and outlawed any further experimentation in the field.

They retained only the simplest kinds of implements — spades and scythes — and horses and wagons. The section of the book dealing with the outlawing of machinery has attracted special attention from students of utopian literature because of its possible bearing on the attitude of certain philosophers who viewed the industrial revolution with alarm and warned of the menace of the machine age. It can hardly be concluded that Butler meant to advocate the elimination of machinery, as some later utopists did, for he treats this attitude as one more example of the susceptibility of the natives to outlandish arguments.

Nevertheless, he sets forth the arguments in such a fashion that the reader is obliged to reflect seriously on the issue and recognize in advancing technology some serious threats to human values. The reader, following the narrator's shifting attitude from admiration to surprise and finally to contempt, is led to believe that the author is bent on demonstrating the vast inferiority of the Erewhonians to his fellow Englishmen; but it gradually becomes clear that he attributes to Englishmen much of the irrationality and the ingenious equivocations that make the Erewhonians look foolish.

The difference is only one of degree. The technique is close to that of Swiftian satire. It is clear that the author does not necessarily support the ideas presented by Hythloday.

However, while More might not have envisioned Utopia as a perfect society, it is inarguable that he forwarded utilitarian, rational Utopia as a criticism of the European world he saw around him.

It is vital, then, to understand that the book is a response to a specific historical time. There are many ways to analyze the society of Utopia. It can be thought of as the culmination of rational thought or Humanist beliefs, as an alternative to feudalism, a statement in favor of communal society, or an effort to promote reform according to Christian values.

These different critical approaches are not mutually exclusive, and Sir Thomas More was certainly aware of the complexity of meanings embedded in his book. The book is composed of two parts; paradoxically, the first written last and the second written first.

It is the second book that depicts Utopian society and which most closely resembles the Humanist thinking of Erasmus. The first book serves as an introduction to the second, but also as a commentary on it. In fact, the first book was itself likely written in two parts. Initially, it was simply a short introduction, a way to introduce the fictional More to the character of Hythloday. The second part of the first book involves an extended speech by Hythloday on a number of issues, some that were of vital and personal interest to More the author, others that provide a certain insight into Hythloday and perhaps reveal him to be not quite as knowledgeable as one might first believe.

Utopia is, then, a depiction of a semi-ideal society and all of the criticism of European society that ideal represents, and it is a commentary on itself and its themes. Often, Utopia, the product of a profound thinker who was still developing his thought, seems to question itself.

The book can at times be paradoxical, just as More himself could: a man who preached religious toleration and methodically persecuted Protestants, who decided to remain a lay Christian rather than enter the priesthood but ultimately died a martyr for his faith. Ultimately, Utopia is a book that, like More, attempted to navigate a course through the ideal and the real, between a desire to create perfection and the pragmatic understanding that perfection, given the fallibility of mankind, is impossible.

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