Assignment

Patrick Locke

“Interpreting Outsider Endorsement of Utopia”

            The desire to create conditions for a “wisely governed” community is not exclusive to the literary and historical utopia genre (More 4). However, the premise of emulation embedded in the utopian narrative works on the assumption that outsiders will find the utopian model worthy of imitation. Utopias thrive on the establishment and continuity of communal harmony promoting the goals of the collective at the peril of the individual. The availability of choices is either limited or does not exist. Much of the push in these literary and historical endeavors is at odds with human nature. The unpredictability of human behavior is one of the reasons why literary utopias seem unrealistic and why historical attempts at intentional communities with restrictive parameters often fail. Whatever merits are entailed in the ideas of utopian aspirations, the impulse seems counterintuitive to the march of individual progress and creativity. An instructive way to flesh out the restrictions intrinsic to the genre of utopia is to start with a provisional definition of utopia and examine some of the genre’s conventions.

            The word utopia is a combination of Greek parts ou (no) and topos (place), meaning no place or eu (good) and topos, good place. The term utopia implies the impracticality and limitations of idealism and idealistic endeavors. When the word utopia is used, there is an inherent association of implausibility and the imaginary. Consequently, the meaning of the word may prompt dismissals of utopias, bypassing the possibility to fully engage them as a part of a literature of ideas that can provoke discussion on a range of topics including History, Economics, Religion, Civics, or Philosophy.  The aim of a literature of ideas is to provoke more thought than pleasure. Although the two are never completely apart in most narratives, utopian texts may not fully develop the narrative elements of plot and character that make story telling persuasive. Instead, the work emphasizes the didactic and can be read more as an ethnography or lecture.

St. Thomas More’s  Utopia (1515) is the foundational text of the utopian genre. The text is part narrative travelogue and part ideological speculation predating the novel. A comparison with Edward Bellamy’s Looking Backward (1888), Charlotte Gilman’s Herland (1915), and Ayn Rand’s Anthem (1938) texts reveal elements similar to More’s Utopia.  One way to understand the texts is through their relation to one another, which structuralists define as intertexuality. This method is an approach used to determining where texts converge or veer off into subgenres. The codes and conventions may reveal not only some conventions of the genre, but also information on the “social forces engaged in many writers production of literature” (Parker 53).  While emulation is the driving premise in a utopian narrative, the utopian phenomena varies and accounts for challenges in defining the genre.

            The storyline is straightforward in More’s Utopia. In Book I of the text, the character More, who is travelling in Antwerp, is introduced to another traveler named Raphael by a mutual friend. Raphael regales them with stories of “many things that were amiss in those new-discovered countries . . . he reckoned up not a few things from which patterns might be taken for correcting the errors of these nations among whom we live” (More 4). Before the story focuses on “the manners and laws of the Utopians,” there are a range of comparisons made about aspects of English life including politics, economics, and the judicial. The exchange in Book I is instructive because the critique of a known place occurs which all parties are privy to and the dialogue has a range of voices modifying points of view and agendas. This is a contrast to Book II in which all elements relating to Utopia are presented by a single voice, that of Raphael.

            According to Raphael, Utopia is a well-proportioned planned community in which everything is the same: “manners, customs, and laws” (29). Raphael adds “he that knows one of their towns, knows them all” (30)   Every action in Utopia serves a purpose. Across the island, all Utopians’ wear the same clothing. This custom eliminates choice, but more importantly emphasizes group identity over the individual.  Their days are structured to include a six hour work day, and eight hours of sleep each night. They eat dinner at eight o’clock. When they are not eating, sleeping, or working, most Utopians spend their time reading. No aspects of the Utopians’ lives have been left to chance. Travel, warfare, education, and marriages have all been strictly regulated. 

            As an outsider, Raphael finds few faults with Utopian values.  Throughout his speech, he points out areas in which the Utopians distinguish themselves. Raphael is a believer of the system in place. He concludes

[T]he constitution of that commonwealth, which I do not only think the best in the world, but indeed the only commonwealth that truly deserves that name. . . for in other commonwealths, every man knows that unless he provides for himself, how flourishing soever the commonwealth may be, he must die of hunger; so that he sees the necessity of preferring his own concerns to the public; but in Utopia, where every man has a right to everything, they all know that if care is taken to keep the public stores full, no man can want anything . . . (81)

With such an endorsement, no society can measure up to the standards credited to Utopia. At the end of his description, the character More is respectful of the account; however, he leaves open “some other time for examining this subject more particularly” (84). He adds “I cannot perfectly agree to everything he has related; however, there are many things in the Commonwealth of Utopia that I rather wish, than hope to see followed in our governments” (85). The text ends not with a resounding endorsement but with enough skepticism to wonder about the existence of Utopia.

            In Bellamy’s Looking Backyard, the utopian impulse attempts to redress problems stemming from capitalism. The narrator Julien West functions in some respects like Raphael in More’s Utopia. He is an outsider who converts to a believer. Although he does not travel physically to a new place, he is a visitor to a new world through time and will go back in time to relate the things he has learned. Julien falls asleep in Boston 1887 and finds himself awakening in Boston 2000. He left a world on the cusp of social apocalypse to enter one so harmonious in which there are no strikes, wars, class conflicts, or hunger.  The role of government has evolved to reflect a more benevolent relationship between nations and citizens. Like More’s Utopia, an embrace of the values of cooperation, equality, and community ownership has transformed a society into a more humane and nurturing environment. In the Boston of 2000, everything is centralized to ensure uniformity in all spheres of life. While Julien is in Boston of 2000, Dr. Leethe, who is the guide in Boston 2000, provides the didactic moments in the novel and gives smug assessments of the twentieth century. Dr. Leethe is quick to make comparisons between the two time periods. The earlier age is described as one of individualism. In 1887 when it rained, everyone needed an umbrella; therefore, there were as many umbrellas as people on the street. In 2000, society’s collectivism is reflected in the use of only one umbrella to protect the people from rain.

            Keri Welborn’s 2005 midterm, “Utopia: Ideal Perfection,” notes that Looking Backward as a construction of “an idealistically perfect society” is a way to analyze problems of that Age.  Bellamy’s narrative is written during the Gilded Age when industrialization and the increasing gap between rich and poor threatened the stability of the country. The novel provides a space for dialogue addressing a range of issues tilting the balance in society. As part of a larger dialogue, Looking Backward challenges the routine dismissal of utopian narratives. A society does not have to validate all the ideas presented in a utopian narrative, but may find in some ideas reasonable starting points to begin a discussion on how to balance power and respond to social ills. These ideas may contradict and challenge expectations, but a discussion about the issues is a way to explore solutions and is an essential part of an open and evolving society. However, an open conversation with multiple voices and points of view is something that the utopian narrative fails to deliver. In Looking Backward, Julien expresses interest in the history of events between 2000 and 1887, yet time after time Dr. Leethe directs his attention to how things are. The historical record when probed rests on consensus, and it is promoted as a reason to accept what becomes part of the group’s collective history. The comparison between the two eras favors what presently takes place. Julien cannot offer anything other than his readiness to accept the changes he encounters.  As an outsider, Julien is not free to explore questions or ideas challenging what he experiences and knows.

            Charlotte Gilman’s novel Herland resolves the outsiders’ willingness to convert by having three visitors with different sensibilities respond to the utopia Herland. The dialogue of the travelers provides multiple perspectives contrasting to those of the women in Herland.  The men share a love for adventure, yet they are not of one mind. They have different interests, and they come from different backgrounds. The story is narrated by Van who provides the moderate response between the polar views of the other travelers. His skepticism remains balanced by a willingness to ask questions that are not driven by the macho cynicism like Terry or the trustfulness of Jeff.  Like Raphael’s Utopia, Herland is shrouded in mystery and little is known about it other than there exists “a strange country where no men live” (2). Gilman’s narrative builds a level of suspense to shape the account by combining elements of adventure, romance, and ecological narratives to create a story that is not driven by the didactic. 

The women in Herland have created a regulated society quite similar to Raphael’s Utopia and Dr. Leethe’s Boston. In Herland, “everything was beauty, order, perfect cleanness, and the pleasantest sense of home” (19). Van, one of the visitors adds, “their time-sense was not limited to the hopes and ambitions of an individual life. Therefore, they habitually considered and carried out plans for improvement which might cover centuries” (79).  The inhabitants of Herland have controlled not only the natural environment; they have also tempered human nature. For a place with limited space, Herlandians were conscious of maximizing food supply to be able to sustain themselves. They systematically planted only trees that would bear edible fruit. In the case of a tree which bore no fruit, they experimented for nine hundred years until the tree produced an edible product. The diligence to this “little shut-in piece of land where one would have thought an ordinary people would have been starved out” is impressive (79).  For converts to a utopia, it is hard to resist making a comparison to the familiar. The comparisons are presented in way that begs emulation.

Herland combines plot, character and ideas to expand the possibility of the genre.

The text confounds expectations and stereotypes about gender. As a literature of ideas, it can be instructive in raising questions about gender roles and expectations. The men encounter a world in which women have established a system harmonious and self sustaining. The visitors can not find anything to verify their suspicion that there must be other men around. Although the strength of the narrative builds on the men’s doubts and assumptions, the story loses some of its verve because much of the narration is driven by their point of view.  The men’s perspective alters the narrative potency because they are always in the frame. As outsiders, they can compare the women in Herland to what they know. In contrast, the women have to sift through the men’s biased accounts to get a sense of the outside and others of their gender.  Utopian narratives shed light on ideas that could be acted and are open to speculation. However, the exploration of certain ideas in a utopia always seems on the verge of pointing to something else more sinister. All the novels touch on the family unit and eugenics. Although the ideas are presented in a welcoming environment, the proposal invites fascist or totalitarian comparisons.

In Ayn Rand’s novel Anthem, the indictment of a society that has stifled the will of the individual is described by the narrator Equality 7-2521.  The narrator has committed a sin marking him as outside the norm. In a dystopia, it takes an insider in a shifting role as an outsider to argue against the system.  As a disbeliever, the narrator is able to question the way things are. A dystopian narrative is driven by a series of conflicts requiring resolution. In contrast, a utopian narrative functions in a space that has resolved conflicts and has established ways of maintaining order agreeable to all. The risk of challenging means distrusting everything to create a new space. Equality 7-2521 is aware that each transgression marks his individuality. Each move he makes affirms his resistance and his acknowledgment of risk. It is a matter of choice to challenge. The function of the narrator as an outsider is significant in a utopian narrative, as chroniclers they have a perspective that insiders have not seen yet.

When the ideas of the community and uniformity go stale, a utopia becomes a dystopia. It is not enough to say that one man’s utopia is another man’s dystopia; dysfunctional systems seem more real than imagined and always demand an act of resistance.  The dark feels much easier to dread  than a reach for the light in utopias.

                                           Citation not on Class Reading List

Parker, Robert D. How to Interpret Literature: Critical Theory for Literary and Cultural

            Studies.  New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. Print.