An online, web-based game, found at http://games.swirve.com/utopia/ - easily one of the more addictive online games around.

You get to run a province in a medieval kingdom, a choice of 8 races, various buildings to build, various military types based on race, wizard spells, thieves and thievery ... and you get dumped in a kingdom of 25 provinces, controlled by other human players with whom you must cooperate. There's 25 provinces per kingdom, 50 kingdoms per island and about 50 islands in the game, making for a LOT of players. real fun.

When Sir Thomas Moore coined the term in his book of the same name, he created the word from the greeek Ou, "not" or "no", and topos, "place". Thus "utopia" originally meant "Nonexistant Place" or "Nowhere".

However, due to the idealized nature of Moore's Utopia, it became a common misconception that the word was formed from Eu, "good", and topos, and thus meant "Good Place". The latter meaning stuck, and has become the primary meaning of the word.

• Book 1
• Book 2
  • Chapter 1  Of Their Towns, Particularly of Amaurot
  • Chapter 2  Of Their Magistrates
  • Chapter 3  Of Their Trades, and Manner of Life
  • Chapter 4  Of Their Traffic
  • Chapter 5  Of the Travelling of the Utopians
  • Chapter 6  Of Their Slaves, and of Their Marriages
  • Chapter 7  Of Their Military Discipline
  • Chapter 8  Of the Religions of the Utopians

Utopia, the name given to Sir Thomas More to the imaginary island which he makes the scene of his famous political romance "The Ideal Republic, which is the New Island of Utopia." More represents this island as has having been discovered by Raphael Hythloday, a companion of Amerigo Vespucci, but it of course is England, the capital Amaurote, London. Its laws and institutions are represented as described in one afternoon's talk at Antwerp, occupying the whole of the second book, to which, indeed, the first serves but as a framework. More's romance, or rather satire, obtained a wide popularity, and supplied (though incorrectly enough) the epithet Utopian to all impracticable schemes for the improvement of society.

Being a detailed discussion of whether or not Thomas More's Utopia is in fact an ideal society at all; and being more useful to those with some knowledge of the text than the layman, who should consult one of the above writeups first, though not the 'Everybody'sCyclopaedia' one, since it be full of inaccuracies, the most glaring of which is the assertion that Utopia represents England. But still perhaps being of some interest to those who have not read the book, as an introduction to the kind of thing one may expect to encounter. And being also my first noded univeristy homework. Ooh!

Written with reference to Ralph Robinson's first translation from the Latin; there is a more accesible and excellent modern version available in Penguin, translated by Paul Turner.

When compared with 16th century Europe, Utopia may very well initially appear to be a direct successor to Plato's republic. It is a harmoniously organised little nation, a society where everyone has a role to play and everyone embraces this role fully. Utopia never goes to war unless it has to; Utopia knows the absurdity of the superficial; Utopia runs like clockwork. Utopians are delighted to be living in `the best state of a commonwealth' on earth. Compared to a Western world which was in the middle of an era of absolutist monarchy in which kings would attack each other for little reason beyond la gloire and a base desire for expansion for its own sake, Utopia might very well have seemed like a haven of reason and calm.

Equally, it is important not to impose twenty-first century values on to a sixteenth century text. We may feel a certain revulsion at the use of slavery as a form of punishment, for example, or consider the supposedly liberal allowance of religious toleration so long as

no man should conceive so vile and base an opinion of the dignity of man's nature as to think that the souls do die and perish with the body, or that the world runneth at all adventures, governed by no divine providence

The context in which this text must be taken, then, is one of 16th century Christian values. More was a man who died for his faith; it is safe to say that he took it seriously. If Utopia is seriously divergent from the kind of values which he would have held dear it is impossible that it can be meant to be taken as a straightforward manifesto for a better kind of society towards which Europe should aspire.

But then there is the problem of deciding what those values were. By most Christian standards of the era, the idea of euthanasia would be an abomination, a terrible crime against God; but the passage advocating it in Utopia does not appear in the slightest ironic, and it is conceivable that More's biblical interpretation allowed him to diverge from the mainstream of Christianity on this issue. Then again, it is also arguable, given More's insistence, for example, that the King could not divorce Catherine of Aragon, that he was a man of theological traditionalism, and that his advocacy of euthanasia is strong evidence that he did not intend his work to be taken entirely seriously.

There is further evidence for such a case. The custom of

showing the woman, be she maid or widow, naked to the wooer

nature proscribeth to us a joyful life, that is to say, pleasure, as the end of all our operations

The strongest piece of evidence, perhaps, in this direction, is More's (admittedly limited) allowance of divorce: if

it chanceth whereas the man and woman cannot well agree between themselves, both of them finding other, with whom they hope to live more quietly and merrily, that they by the full consent of them both be divorced asunder and married again to other.

This is remarkable. Here is a man who was executed, ultimately, for his refusal to sanction a divorce and thus acknowledge the fallibility of the pope, suggesting that divorce is within the scope of the morally acceptable.

There may be a kind of qualification here. If More's discomfort at the idea of Henry divorcing Catherine was rooted entirely in the fact that to do so would be to admit that the leader of the Catholic church was not infallible then it might be argued that, since Utopian divorce would be outside of the pope's jurisdiction, it would be allowable. (Also, of course, Utopia was written before this issue arose: it is possible that More's views hardened.) Nevertheless, this is a subtle distinction, and surely not one that More could have been confident of his audience making. Superficially, it looks like a contradiction.

Though some of these points are persuasive, they are probably not enough to convince the reader that More's work is not intended to be instructive. There are very many aspects of the society of Utopia which would certainly have seemed attractive to More, and to many contemporary readers; there are many aspects, too, which may attract the modern reader just as much. Utopian leaders are incorruptible; Utopians are pacifistic except in the last resort; Utopians live in genuine communities; Utopians very rarely commit crime, because they have no need to; Utopians respect all law-abiding members of society (except, of course, for the mentally disabled, a rather less attractive trait).

We are left, then, with an apparent contradiction. It is highly unlikely that More's vision of a perfect England, or other European country, would precisely mirror Utopia; but he certainly intends it to be a kind of successor to Plato's Republic, and also believes that the residents of Utopia would be happy. Probably, too, More genuinely believes in the form of communism which he advocates. (Again, it is important to avoid bringing a modern sensibility too much to bear here: our view of practical communism must inevitably be coloured by the experiments of the past century.)

It may be instructive to consider Swift's Gulliver's Travels. It is an occasional misreading of this work to argue that the last book, the voyage to the land of the Houyhnhnms, is a recommendation of how human beings ought to live. Similarly, a more common misreading, perhaps closer to reality, exists: this suggests that in fact, Swift, as well as mocking Gulliver, is mocking those who would try to perfect human nature, and considers the whole pursuit of self-improvement absurd. Rather than either of these extremes, a middle point is surely more accurate: Swift recognises the impossibility of humans behaving perfectly reasonably, and considers it the utmost folly to attempt to deny their `Yahoo' nature; but at the same time, he advocates the use of reason as far as possible, and is certainly closer to the Houyhnhnms in his sympathies than he is to the brutal, animalistic Yahoos.

Similarly, there is a more balanced view about Utopia. Utopia is not a perfect republic by any means, and it is certainly not intended to form a manifesto for a new kind of society. But it is in powerful contrast with the flaws of European nations. In feudal Europe social justice of any kind was nothing more than a fantasy, in Europe a very few lived extremely well and the vast majority lived in squalor; in Utopia society is absolutely equal, to the extent that those with extraordinary talents are no more rewarded than those with almost none. From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs: this old socialist ideal seems to be obeyed to the letter in Utopia. But given More was a successful man who had taken advantage of his gifts to become a man of great repute, it seems unlikely that he was an absolute communist in this sense. Rather, he looked at the deeply unequal European system and, in order to emphasise its flaws, made Utopia the absolute opposite. Thus, Utopia is a work designed to offer one way of living which, whilst not ideal or even possible, is important simply as an alternative which points out some of the failings of the culture in which he lived.

Let us not forget, too, that More was a true scholar, a man who, we may reasonably assume, was interested in ideas for their own sake. There is a sense in which we do not need to consider Utopia in any kind of context at all, but can see it simply as a fascinating document of an imaginary civilisation, one which is interesting because it is extraordinarily well described, both in depth and in breadth. Utopia is quite capable of standing on its own as a work of art irrespective of any role as satire, manifesto, or judgement.

Nevertheless, we should not feel that our own response to Utopia is any the less valid because we view it through a twenty-first century prism. It does seem that Utopia is a society which any modern reader would be hard-pressed to argue is truly `ideal'.

As Stephen Greenblatt suggests, Utopia is a society in which citizens are offered a freedom which is gradually qualified and qualified and qualified until it is not really a freedom at all. Religious toleration exists, so long as you don't want to be irreligious. You may travel wherever you please, so long as you get permission, and so long as your family don't mind, and so long as you don't mind that you may not eat until you have done half a day's work. You may consider yourself an equal of all, except that women beg their husbands' forgiveness for their sins, and old men are served before young at table, and dignitaries get the best food of all. You may train for more than one job, and, once trained, may do whichever of them you please, except when one of them is more necessary than the other. You are quite free to hold political opinions, except that the penalty for discussing affairs of state away from the `senate' is death.

If Utopia were a gangster, it wouldn't tell you to hand over your money or face the consequences: it would tell you that, whilst you are quite free to do as you wish with your money, if you hand it over Utopia will make sure that nothing bad happens to you, but won't be held responsible for the consequences if you don't. It is an insidious kind of tyranny which works by persuading the people that it is all for their own good, and proceeds almost to enslave them to the state and remove as many elements of choice as possible. Even if, in a century in which such tyranny would have seemed almost normal, More is not himself making a moral judgement against such behaviour - and it seems that he is not, for his namesake narrator's qualification that `many things came to my mind which in the manners and laws of that people seemed to be instituted and founded of no good reason' is hardly a damning indictment - we may do so, and consider much of the Utopian system abhorrent. And Shakespeare, less than a hundred years later, understood that a system which allows no flourish, no splendour, and, ultimately, no beauty, could never be a spiritually rich one: Allow not nature more than nature needs, / Man's life's as cheap as beast's, cries King Lear, and it is hard not to agree with him.

Whilst such concerns about freedom might seem absurd to a contemporary serf, to a modern reader the limitations placed upon the Utopian people would be anathema. And many of the minor points which More makes seem utterly barbaric in modern times, and often hypocritical; they are too numerous to list exhaustively, but, for example, the nation which prides itself on the value it places on its citizens' lives believes that they should do a very good thing for all mankind if they could rid out of the world all that foul stinking den of that most wicked and cursed people (the Zapoletes); the nation that prides itself on justice believes that execution is a reasonable reprisal for adultery; the nation that prides itself on religious toleration warns that any who do not quickly repent after excommunication be taken and punished (physically) of the council as wicked and irreligious.

Again, ambiguities arise. We cannot really know what More really thinks. As well as the layers of uncertainty already referred to, there is the question of the narrator's identity, of whether More is really the man who says very little but remains sceptical, or if he is in fact the man whose name means `Nonsense' but who speaks persuasively and at length. Who Thomas More is in this work is a mystery.

Ultimately, though, it is not necessary to resolve this ambiguity. It is one of the great pleasures of Utopia that we are never quite certain of what the author intends; he may not even know himself. The book is no less successful for being complex and contradictory and hard to fit into a box; in fact, it is more so. More, like Walt Whitman, contains multitudes.

Before writing this I read an excellent essay by one Stephen Greenblatt called 'At the table of the great'; but the ideas are my own except in the instance where his name is mentioned.

PROBLEMS, CONSTRAINTS AND CONTRADICTIONS
The Utopia is a model of perfection (as well as an engaging literary genre, the term having been constructed by Sir Thomas More), but it's not that simple as this perfection could entail any of the following definitions:

What sense of the word `perfect' are we using when we conceptualise a `perfect world'? In my view we are attempting to establish something absolute, with no flaws of any kind. At the risk of pedantry, the defining feature of a Utopian society is `ideal (the greatest extent of) perfection' as described below. Most of the following are based on the premise that we must either:
a) Re-sculpt or otherwise alter our surroundings to attain a fixed physical perfection, or
b) Alter ourselves individually in order to change our perception of perfection.
Please note that we are discussing creating a reality which is perfect for us as a species, or perhaps even `us' as an exclusive ideology. Obviously this is an oversight in many instances, and very few of the following assume that the reality we sculpt will be to our desires only.

Firstly, it must invariably be accepted that human beings as individuals are, just as humankind as a whole is, inherently imperfect. This is true in that we all could be improved in some manner - the majority of definitions support this anyway. Perhaps, though, we are merely discussing perfection in terms of being an adequate component of a whole, although this seems to do poor service to the concept of perfection and to the unfathomable nature of utopias. Utopias are contemporarily understood as being `perfect' in the sense that improvements are impossible, inextricable from the recognition that this type of perfection is a mere flight of fancy. I would like to opine that we are either incapable of conceiving of perfection or of recognising it were we to see it, although this opinion rests upon the same basis of evidence as any other - none.

Utopias presumably meet every need of every individual within the society. While material subjugation and the creation of economic caste systems exist, equality (which is not necessarily synonymous with the meeting of needs, but often helps a great deal) is a fiction, which means that an unequal balance of power cannot spawn or govern perfection, if this perfection is to be based on consensus. If a central agent (a computer, say, or an oligarchy composed of the intellectual elite) is responsible for all decisions instead, it cannot be expected to account for the variables involved with each individual identity, nor even to care. There is debate as to what constitutes a need (an extremity of desire, really, albeit usually survival-oriented) and these are likely to vary between individuals. Unless a single entity can be formed from the collective consciousness of everyone, the system will fail someone at some point. Besides, a conglomerate entity is not really a society.

Humankind does not merely accept - it conquers. Each individual has perspectives at odds with the majority of society, which we are engineered to express as action. We change our surroundings - it's the reason why we've survived. How to nullify this selfish impulse? That's the paradox: the survival instinct is a fatal flaw in the construction of `perfection'. Well, granted, there is a community impulse in the human makeup, but it's a community which thrives on competition and disparity. This does not disqualify it from utopian status. Suppose for a moment that prevention of selfish behaviour (especially expression in physical violence) is no longer considered necessary for a perfect society or is rendered irrelevant by separation from one's fellows. You could remove the above point if we accept Plato's model which states that subjection of the masses is a natural thing, although there is no evidence to suggest that such a system has any merit - the main problem is, once again, individual difference.

If we must alter ourselves (with a chemical, say, or false stimuli - yes, I do recall the Matrix) then we must first create a self-perpetuating system which can ensure the maintenance of this illusion. We do not know how to create self-sustaining machines which can be entirely relied upon, nor (in my opinion) would we accept the subversion of our senses so readily. There is always the fear of incompatibility or technical fault. This seems to hearken back to the survival instinct which urges us to trust only what we can personally detect. Suppose we transcend biology and manage to immerse ourselves in constant pleasure - there is a limit to our threshold of experience, even if we assume that it can be maintained constantly without internal destruction.

Maybe utopia will never see a terrestrial incarnation. I find it highly unlikely that all the necessary pieces will fall into place themselves, and as a species we have an abundance of examples as to how social engineering can go terribly wrong.

Utopia: A difficult to read, final contribution for The Blood is the Life: A Frightful Halloween Quest

There are those who oppose utopianism.

It is shameful that people cannot learn to control their inconsistencies. The idea that people are to be applauded for their ridiculous lack of conformity began in the latter part of the twentieth century, although due to the nature of such a social change, this transformation went unnoticed for the better part of fifty years. The introduction of popular social ideals was partially the result of increased personal awareness, partially the result of a blurring of gender distinctions, both within and between masculine and feminine traditions. The purpose of life, for the masses, mutated into a joyous procession of self-gratifying aims. The message was to shape life to your own desires, to take what you want and leave the dead husk of uniformity behind you, to take yourself as far as possible from the homogeneity of everyday existence. This was not the sixties ideal, this was no `flower power', or an army of LSD-consuming hallucinates attempting to shape the world with ineffectual slogans (but no real power). There were always those who dismissed the movements of the time as ineffectual, merely another dysfunctional outcrop of disgruntled teenagers, but the truth was that the new movements were real, were coherent in their incoherence, clear guidelines lay within their blurred boundaries. `Girl power' and `new lad', `net-head' and `cyber-junkie' were all considered to be mere labels, it is true. But peel off the label, scrape away the sticky residue of a thousand young men's eagerly discharged semen, and what you hold is raw power.

It was only through retrospective action on the part of sociologists and geneticists that this lack of conformity was eventually recognised and ultimately reduced to the state in which it now resides; such that only a handful of these nihilistic pockets still remain to blight the otherwise perfect lives of the thirty billion inhabitants of the new earth.

Essentially, the population of the earth has now been split into two factions, each with its own set of privileges and rules; in essence a return to quasi-slavery. Of course, the determination of who should be destined for which class is no longer made on such trivialities as skin colour or religion, for such insignificancies have become obsolete in the carefully crafted sociological ideals of the early twenty-third century. Genetic analysis and constant psychological assessment are the deciding factors where such issues are concerned, constant psychological analysis being undertaken by a small implant, inserted at birth, around which yet another entire underground culture has arisen, dedicated to hacking, removing, inserting and generally fucking-up the whole implant scene.

At one point, the popular scientists of the late twenty-first century verged on fervent obsession with regard to the business of predicting man's future. Doom laden techno-prophets, perhaps suffering from nostalgic obsessions, prophesied that man would evolve or (more accurately) devolve into a weak, bulky creature unable to bear its own weight for extended periods. Choosing to slump in its armchair for hours every day, venturing forth only to stock up on potato chips and chocolate bars, mankind was thus condemned, its predicted goal to become repulsive, slug-like monstrosities, legs stunted and thickened in a desperate attempt to produce something capable of supporting its body, hands and arms shortened into tiny feeding apparatus fit only for shovelling food from packet to mouth, packet to mouth. No doubt it would eventually perish under the weight of its own frame.

Such a view was at the time patently ridiculous, for two reasons. The first of these relies on the idiosyncrasies of natural selection, the second of these to its subjugation by technology. It remains impossible, foolish even, to deny the existence of natural selection. If a genetic tendency to a particular attribute leads to advantage in the quest for reproductive success, then this genetic tendency will be passed on to the individual's progeny. Such an occurrence sounds simple, and indeed it is, but it should be remembered that this process takes time to occur, and it should also be remembered that it is only genetic tendencies which lead to a particular advantage that will eventually proliferate and become the norm. Taking this to an extreme example, a tendency to expire during adolescence will scarcely become popular, for such offspring will not reach puberty, let alone live to produce offspring with a similar tendency. Scientists failed to ask themselves whether such a view of mankind as a downgraded cephalopod was a step up from its current status. Natural selection only works for the better, as it were.

The second reason, the subjugation of natural selection by technology, is clearly possible, and has been to some extent for the past two hundred years. As with all technologies, its growth has been exponential to the extent that now a sufficient amount of cash will buy you a couple of sessions with a genetic designer, in a manner fairly similar to the growth in popularity and accessibility of hair and clothes designers. A number of months and a fairly intensive sequencing process later and you can be holding your very own custom child. The first genetic designers were able to offer very little of course, usually something as simple as obvious as choice of hair colour or as immeasurable (and, before the demands for proof from many consumer associations, as non-existant) as removal of suicidal tendencies. However, as constant improvements were made in DNA analysis, so work was undertaken to improve the choices one could make; for a little while animal-print babies were in vogue, although this soon gave way to a less garish golden-brown. But even this minor cosmetic platitude was all but stopped when the sociogeneticists took over the system and began enforced regulation of the practice.

Government Subsidised Family Planning, or Conception Regulation as it was informally known, was received by the public, though not particularly well. Essentially, your genetic specifications were heavily subsidised if you agreed to have a small section of genetic code inserted which, you were informed, would provide increased immune defence and enhanced metabolic efficiency. The downside of this was, of course, that outlandish genetic modifications were refused, and unbeknown to you the inserted genetic code was subtly different to that which was specified. Should you refuse, of course, your genetic specifications were simply denied, and even when you agreed you would usually find that a good deal of your specifications were rejected for whatever reason; genetic incompatibilities in the host strand were usually cited; few consumers knew enough to even understand, let alone argue.

Backstreet geneticists sprang up as a result of this, although the problem was considered negligible by the sociogeneticists, their calculations suggesting the practice was destined for obsolescence by two, maybe three generations, each further generation increasing the proliferation of regulated conceptions. The reasoning behind this speculation was based on the newly inserted genetic codes, such that the only real unknown variable concerned was a prediction of the initial generation who would partake of the regulated conception programme. Based on what was considered to be a conservative estimate, namely that the use of genetic design would remain constant in the coming years, the estimate was that sixty-seven percent of this generation's children would contain the genetic modifications. As a result of the content of these genetic modifications, almost one hundred percent of those people would use genetic design, plus the constant sixty-seven percent of the remaining thirty-three percent of the population. Following these estimates to their conclusion, it was decided that the sociogeneticists would have achieved their goal of complete dependence on genetic design for childbirths with a 95% confidence level in the years between the second and third generations.

The genetic modifications to achieve this performed two basic functions. Firstly, through control of instinct it was hoped that people could be induced to return to the genetic design centres when they came to have their own children. It was accepted that such decisions and other related tendencies were not entirely based on genetics, so this concept was at best considered unreliable. It was decided that the process would be backed up with advertising and other promotion, hopefully well-received by the carefully arranged genetic backward masking. This idea also worked in reverse, of course, and these subtle genetic impulses were likely to be easily swayed by the views and desires of others, so a further modification was added in the form of a slight tendency to infertility. When faced with an inability to conceive naturally, it was argued, where should one turn but to the very place which is insidiously spoken of by your own DNA.

Surprisingly, all of this went to plan, at least up to the 95% confidence interval. As the programme was designed to be subversive, there was never any point at which it seemed appropriate to physically enforce regulated conception. Thus at the end of three generations it became apparent that although almost all of the earth's inhabitants contained appropriate strands of genetic code, there were some who did not. Available records were duly audited, projections made and a new programme of enforced fertility removal was begun. The operation was due to be completed after only six months, although in actuality it took more than eighteen months to reach a conclusion, the difficulties of covertly reducing the fertility of a range of individuals being yet another aspect of the process to be underestimated.

It was some time later that the sociogeneticists took the process a step further and introduced more complex modifications to newly designed children, this time also taking the step of modifying the parents if such an opportunity presented itself, although it often seemed that such an opportunity was contrived rather than perceived. It was also at this point that the sociogeneticists performed a final audit of available records, once more braving the prohibitive costs of such an exercise in order to achieve a state of blissful confidence. Such a state once more failed to materialise, although this was not due to the results of the audit, which loudly proclaimed that the subjugation of earth had gone entirely to plan. Indeed, for a period of some days the sociogeneticists frenziedly planned their final step in the regulation of human existence, this condescending itinerary increasingly nudged off course by an increasingly disturbing series of events.

These events began with what was finally decided to be the work of a single hacker, perhaps acting as the frontman of an underground organisation, perhaps simply a lone gunman desperate to make a point before being swept away in the events that would ineveitably follow. The subtle replacement of all occurrences of the word `modification' with `tampering' went unnoticed for some hours, and a series of complex documents were published and sent out to genetic centres all over the world before the error was noticed and a search and replace recovery daemon could be initiated.

The second and third of the events took the form of fairly substantial incendiary devices, one placed before the Centre For Social And Genetic Change in London, the second in the sub-centre in New York. Neither device was noticed until considerable and almost simultaneous explosions took place with significant loss of life in each case. Even so, it was fortunate that around 75% of the total occupants of both buildings were virtual avatars from other sub-centres, although many of those suffered psychological damage through the sudden dissolution of their online reality. On a grimly successful note there were even a small number of unfortunates who happened to be online at a separate building as their bodies were burnt to a crisp, causing a number of problems in other sub-centres as their avatars unintentionally reproduced their death throes in a myriad corrupted files and spurious commands. In addition to this, almost as a cruel recognition of the complexities of fate and coincidence, there were those who were in both centres at once, experiencing either extreme mental pain followed by swift incineration or its antithesis depending upon their particular physical and online locations.

Thus began the next stage in the sociogenetic revolution. There were now two factions at work, the sociogeneticists and their opponents, who quickly came to be known as the rebels in the time honoured tradition of faction related nomenclature. The general populace were by this time firmly affiliated to the sociogeneticists, and even when the rebel factions briefly experimented with their own genetic modifications of the unwilling citizens the sociogeneticists' modifications proved to be so subtly intertwined with the normal DNA code that they were impossible to define and excise; no doubt the majority of the changes remained unfound, even with the processing and data handling capacities of the current age's gene sequencing and DNA replication mechanisms.

Each side of the revolution had its own strengths and weaknesses. The sociogeneticists were quite at ease with their task, their view of mankind's direction so immersed in the future that the timescale of the project did not matter in the least. The majority of mankind was slightly less intelligent, substantially less aggressive, also far less sexual and generally more docile, almost like an entire race of drones. The rebel pockets would eventually be conquered by current methods, it was argued with confidence, no matter how long such a task would take. The rebels, on the other hand, were at present impatient to acquire records, to destroy the technology-enforced dictatorship, to free the enslaved millions by whatever means necessary. Their future was the week ahead, their need was immediate. Action took place on a daily basis, whether it was the attempted infiltration of the Centre by anonymous avatars or the immolation of known sociogeneticists.

Still the sociogeneticists persisted with their earlier tactics, and it is not to be assumed that their efforts were ineffectual, for the number of rebels dropped at almost the same rate as the number of sociogeneticists - each new acquisition exposed to retroviral agents; their genetic structure altered to the new norm. Eventually, the rebel faction split further. There were those who wished to fight, and there were those who wished merely to survive. In general, those who wished to fight often found themselves conquered in the process, and those who wished to survive fared only a little better.

The battle for individuality is difficult cause.

Thomas More’s book Utopia, while notoriously hard to characterize, is nonetheless a product of its time. It addresses the concerns of More and his humanist contemporaries in both style and content, and is also in part a critique of European government and politics. This is most clear in book one, in which Raphael Hythloday describes a debate he had with a lawyer, and sets forth ideals of justice and communism. I will focus on this first book of Utopia in this analysis, but will also refer to the second book and to writings about Utopia by various scholars.

Utopia was written in the form of a dialogue, a return to classical style. This is one of several traits that exhibit its foundations in humanism. Like other humanists, More rejected the logical, carefully structured Latin of much of academia and wrote in a manner more reminiscent of classical Roman writers. Peter Giles described the work as “preserving a pure Latin style,” but the resulting feel is also one that can be described by Robert M. Adams as “simple, conversational, and everyday.”

The dialogue form of Utopia also shows the particular influence of the works of Plato on More’s book. Plato is mentioned no fewer than six times in book one alone, and More seems to regard Plato’s Republic as the prototypical predecessor to his own work. Giles described Utopia as “going far beyond Plato’s Republic,” so he too must have seen a connection between the two. The Republic had only recently been translated into Latin when More wrote Utopia, so it was a novel source of ideas for late medieval thinkers.

The humanist endeavor that led to the translation of the Republic also led to new trends in intellectualism. There is evidence of this change in intellectual paths in the text itself in the form of More’s central character, Raphael Hythloday. Raphael, a philosopher and intellectual, “knows a good deal of Latin, and is particularly learned in Greek,” the latter a language little studied in Western Europe before the humanist movement. Raphael seems to be strongly attracted to this humanist enterprise, and is particularly interested in ancient Greek philosophy. Indeed, Raphael seems to represent an ideal of humanism: a scholar and explorer, not only studying the knowledge of the ancients, but traveling and discovering new things for himself. Raphael also resembles many great real-life scholars of his time in that he abandoned an inherited position of nobility in favor of his quest for knowledge.

At this point in Raphael’s life, though, another distinctly 16th century influence came into play. Raphael travelled with Amerigo Vespucci on three of his four voyages. Tales of Vespucci’s voyages were very widely read at this time, and More’s references to the New World within his own story take advantage of it being a subject of much interest. The basic narrative construction of Utopia, particularly in book two, relies on there being places in the world about which very little is known, and in which explorers are constantly finding new and unusual things. “Nowadays we find all sorts of lands turning up which the old geographers never mentioned,” wrote Giles, in a letter which treats the work as a genuine account. The genre of traveler’s tales, of which Vespucci’s writings were part, was a popular one, but More’s work took the genre in a different direction, mildly mocking it at the same time. “We made no inquiries, however, about monsters, which are the routine of traveler’s tales,” he wrote. “Governments solidly established and sensibly ruled are not so common.” This fantastic quality of traveler’s tales, and Vespucci’s stories in particular, allowed More to write in a very imaginative way without departing from the established genre.

At the same time, More’s story deals with issues of practical importance during a period of great exploration. One of the most essential of these is religious conversion. The voyages of Christopher Columbus and other Europeans were greatly influenced by a desire to spread Christianity, and to either convert or kill those not of what they believed to be the one true faith. More’s fictional explorers behave somewhat differently from this, teaching Christianity to some of their hosts but not publicly preaching. Indeed, one of the Utopians who converted to Christianity “took on himself to preach the Christian religion publicly” and was exiled for “creating a public disorder.” Had these events happened to real European explorers, they probably would have responded violently, but Raphael and his comrades accepted the sovereignty of the Utopian government and took their coreligionist’s exile as the end of the matter.

It seems from this text that More was opposed to the religious violence that took place in the New World in the name of Christianity; while against heresy and by no means religiously tolerant at home, he imagined things functioning differently in this new, unexplored territory. More even goes so far as to state that the founder of Utopia, Utopus, “suspected that God perhaps likes various forms of worship and has therefore deliberately inspired different people with different views.” Though it does not seem that More lived his life according to these principles, they still reflect in an interesting way the time in which he lived. In some earlier periods in history, Europeans had little contact with non-Christians. In these times, it would have been difficult to even imagine people having different views, let alone God liking and respecting their worship.

Raphael also talks about domestic politics, addressing issues such as the proper punishment for theft. He argues strongly that thieves should not be executed, as they were in England in More’s day. Here More again uses to his advantage the fact that much of the world was little known by Europeans of his time, and describes the Polylerites, a people near Persia who have a very different and more humane way of punishing thieves.

Both the Polylerites and the Utopians serve to make the point that it is possible for a society to be more just than that of Christian Europe. Indeed, More’s depiction of Utopia emphasizes the similarities between Christian ideals and Utopian life, and thus implies that Europe is not living up to the ideals set for it by Christ. When Utopians convert to Christianity, he suggests that “they were also much influenced by the fact that Christ had encouraged his disciples to practice community of goods,” an ideal which the Utopians themselves had already realized.

The communism More describes in Utopia was actually much related to the ideals of Protestants whom he despised, and was thus fitting to its time, though not necessarily to its author. It seems that, though More later condemned communism as a heresy, he argues for greater equality of wealth too well not to believe in it at all. He has Raphael say that “as long as you have private property, and as long as cash money is the measure of all things, it is not really possible for a nation to be governed justly or happily.” Throughout this conversation, though, More uses the dialogue form to leave it unclear what view he himself agrees with.

In C.S. Lewis’ writing on the subject, he concludes that More’s later enmity toward communism (and to some degree toward his own book) was a reaction to outside threats to More’s ideals. He compares this to how “any of us might now make criticisms of democracy which we would not repeat in the hour of its danger.” Lewis’ words are reprinted from a book published in 1954, and it is notable that in the 50 years since Western democracy has twice reached what might be regarded as an “hour of its danger,” and both times has reacted as More did.

Americans have recently become less tolerant of skepticism about government policy, as we did during the Cold War. Those who would normally question authority freely and openly now restrain themselves or are restrained by others. Similarly, More was in favor of the intellectual discourse his book generated when it was not threatening to Catholicism, but eventually defended his religion when it was truly threatened, and did so at the expense of his other intellectual values. In the light of the Western response, and particularly the American response, to the threats given the reductionist terms communism and terrorism, More’s reaction to Protestantism becomes more clear.

The essence of Utopia, then, is that it is a place where people can live without the political and religious struggles of More’s day, or indeed any such substantive troubles. There are two ironies to this. One is that More was more engaged in these struggles than nearly anyone else of his time, and probably would not have wanted to live in Utopia, detached from conflict. The other is that Utopia, an impossible, idealized “nowhere,” is actually a reflection of the very real problems of its time.

Works Cited

• Thomas More, Utopia, translated and edited by Robert M. Adams (New York: Norton, 1991).

The above-listed edition of Utopia includes all referenced essays and commentary.

Introduction

More's Utopia started a literary genre, that of utopian writing - books describing idyllic commonwealths which could not exist on earth. However, it also continues an earlier philosophical genre which was started by Plato in The Republic - describing an ideal state which represents the best way to solve the problems of human society in the mind of the author. The book is a discussion between a man called Raphael Hythloday, who is describing the institutions and customs of a people who he claims to have encountered on the island of Utopia ('Nowhere' in Greek, also 'Eutopia' would be 'happy place') and two other men, Thomas More and Peter Giles. Hythloday claims the Utopians have utterly rid themselves of ambition and faction through an egalitarian social system and religious tolerance.

Reading the book

It is a common belief that More's Utopia should be seen alongside Plato's Republic as a piece of 'ideal commonwealth' literature, providing a model for the best (if not the only) way to solve the problems of human society, in this case a Christian one.¹ This view is born out by the fact More chooses to preface both books of Utopia with the subtitle 'The Discourse Of Raphael Hythloday On The Best State Of A Commonwealth'.² It shares with the works of Plato, Aristotle and Cicero discussions about the merits of the active vs. the contemplative life, a discussion of individual morals, a discussion of how to establish a just social order (including the issue of property distribution) and even a discussion of the music appropriate to the ideal commonwealth.

The existence of multiple characters in the work allows More to present different points of view, and the work ends in irresolution, leaving doubt as to which parts are intended to be ironic. Unlike in most of Plato, the other characters do not exist purely to raise spurious objections which are eventually demolished. Hythloday's discourse on the Utopian commonwealth, and his preference for contemplation over the active life, does not escape criticism from the book's other characters, including the fictional 'More' who is depicted as a practical man of politics.

Hence, Hythloday's arguments as to why the Utopians have 'torn up the seeds of ambition and faction at home' cannot be taken as a full representation of More's views, especially as just after Hythloday has made this statement the book is ended with the fictional More's reservations.³ A detailed analysis will perhaps show that the ultimate reason for the Utopians having established the best commonwealth, of which the destruction of ambition and faction is a part, is their single-minded devotion to rational change and progress, something entrenched social classes would resist if it threatened their position.

Civil matters

Hythloday's critique of Christendom in Utopia contains two strands, one civil and one religious. While it is true that the main focus of the work is on secular matters, the critique of contemporary Christianity which resides in the description of the religious practices of the Utopians is another important side to the work. Both concern matters of faction and ambition, which are products of what Hythloday describes as 'the prime plague and begetter of all others - I mean Pride'.⁴ The most striking secular suggestion in Utopia is an endorsement of the Platonic position on the equality of all property among all citizens in the commonwealth (something Plato did not specifically recommend, as he neglected to say whether the communality of property in his own Republic extended beyond the Guardians), and the associated absence of money.

Hythloday argues that gradations of wealth and property created people 'mad with delight over their own blue blood' who are in fact just parasites on society.⁵ Not only are these people not living a virtuous life, they harm the commonwealth through their ambition for as much money and fame as possible, when their accumulation of such things only harms the common person who must work and suffer for them: such is the basis of the critique of enclosure and engrossment in Book 1. The creation of a society in which all have equal amounts of property and gold is held in low regard does away with such problems, as although no-one is poor no-one is spectacularly rich either.

Skinner has argued that More is here making a wholehearted endorsement of this communal way of life, and that the idealism of More's work consists in the argument that 'if private property is the cause of our present discontents', it 'will have to be abolished'.⁶ The Utopians' abolition of faction and ambition in secular matters would hence reside purely in their abolition of private property, which begets the sin of Pride. The communal way of life has Scriptural endorsement, as the early Christians in Acts also 'had everything in common'.⁷ In this interpretation, Hythloday is straightforwardly arguing that the abolition of private property has led to the abolition of faction and ambition, and he also stresses that the Utopian liking for Christianity is based on their admiration for its communal way of life, which exists in Christendom only in the monasteries.

However, the fictional More's objection to this practice at the end of Utopia might point to a subtler meaning. Bradshaw has contended with Skinner whether this is the end-point of the book's argument, as the reservations listed by More at the end of the book include arguments against other parts of the Utopian system which cannot be dismissed as ironic. A deeper meaning is discerned if we note that both books end with the same polemic against the stagnant nature of Christendom, by suggesting that the true genius of the Utopians lies in their acceptance of any new practice which reason recommends to them. Book I ends with Hythloday stating that 'this readiness to learn is, I think, the really important reason for their being better governed and living more happily than we do, though we are not inferior to them in brains or resources.'⁸

It is hence the concern with education and learning, shared by humanists in More's circle, which has allowed the Utopians to abolish faction and ambition: for each citizen puts the commonwealth first, and as they own nothing they do not fear losing their property when society needs to change.

Religion In religious matters, the Utopians have also abolished both the faction of sectionalism and the ambition of the priesthood. When Utopus first arrived on the island, he was able to conquer it easily due to the fighting between various religious groups. Afterwards, he prescribed a law whereby no-one could fight about religion and any form of worship of the Supreme Being was allowed, as he saw peace was 'completely undermined by constant quarrels and implacable hatreds' relating to religion.⁹ Religious services were kept united as public services only led worship in ways which were offensive to none of the religious groups, and extra ceremonies could be performed in private buildings.

More, like other Christian humanists, seems to be taking the stress of Christianity away from ritual, dogma and ceremony and placing virtuous action at its centre. The Utopians are the most virtuous of pagans, and when they hear the word of Christ by being exposed to the Bible some choose to convert. Hythloday points out that they endorse the Stoic position on the definition of virtue, in that they 'define virtue as living according to nature; and God, they say, created us to that end'.¹⁰ However, their aim in seeking virtue is the Epicurean one, which was that in pleasure `all or the most important part of human happiness consists' - hence they seek the virtues for pleasure, not as ends in themselves.¹¹

Their definition of virtue means that their religion leads them to live virtuously and without egoism or faction, and More is trying to make the point that the Scripture and right reason lead people to arrive at the same conclusion, which is why the Utopians have no trouble adopting Christianity. As for the end of virtue, Hythloday argues that they are 'rather too much inclined' to the preference for pleasure - a rare criticism by him of Utopian culture, and a vice of theirs which perhaps would pass away if they adopted Christianity.

Conclusion

The Utopians can hence be seen as having torn up the seeds of ambition and faction by having civic and religious institutions which regard the greater good rather than individual advancement. They are bound together by institutions which serve not individual parasitical elements like the courtiers in Book 1 who prescribe pragmatic but immoral policies, or moneylenders or goldsmiths who do not serve a productive purpose, but rather the whole commonwealth. This is why Hythloday argues that it is the only 'commonwealth' that deserves the name, because it alone exists solely for the common weal. The island has no executive ruling over it but rather a council of citizens.

United in their observance of natural law and educated in such by the priests, the Utopians do not need masses of laws to restrain them from immoral activity, as their fear of God and communal spirit is enough. The abolition of property and money has abolished pride, which takes with it the striving for power and money which constitutes faction. This has provided the Utopians with stable institutions which can withstand change when it is rationally desirable, and also ones which More is suggesting are compatible with Christianity.

Hythloday the philosopher endorses the measures taken to abolish faction and ambition, but the practical politician More ends the piece by echoing the Aristotelian position that such levelling could destroy the basis of authority and society itself. Although this fundamental dichotomy is left unresolved, More ends the book by saying that Utopian institutions contain features he would 'wish rather than expect to see' in European Christendom.¹² Hence both More and the Utopians agree on the idea of rationally advancing and reforming society towards goals, however varying the content of these goals may be.

1.For instance, B. Bradshaw, 'More on Utopia', Historical Journal (1981), pp. 18 - 27
2. Thomas More, Utopia, trans. G.M. Logan and R.M. Adams (Cambridge, 1989), pp. 8, 41
3. Ibid., pp. 106 - 7
4. Ibid., p. 106
5. Ibid., p. 69
6. Quentin Skinner, The Foundations of Modern Political Thought. Vol. 1: the Renaissance (Cambridge, 1978), p. 262
7. Acts 2:44
8. More, op. cit., p. 40
9. Ibid., pp. 94 - 5
10. Ibid., p. 67
11. Ibid., p. 65
12. Ibid., p. 107

U*to"pi*a (?), n. [NL., fr. Gr. not + a place.]

1.

An imaginary island, represented by Sir Thomas More, in a work called Utopia, as enjoying the greatest perfection in politics, laws, and the like. See Utopia, in the Dictionary of Noted Names in Fiction.

2.

Hence, any place or state of ideal perfection.

© Webster 1913.