Dystopian features in "Utopia" by Thomas More and their effects on reliability and perception

Dystopian features in Author: Manü Mohr
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3668603588
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 32

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2011 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 1,3, University of Stuttgart, language: English, abstract: This term paper will identify and analyse ambiguous or dystopian aspects in More's "Utopia". First of all, I will dwell upon the author's personal background and see to what extent and why his own vita can be recovered in several passages. As exemplification of such inconsistencies within this "perfect state", both the names of the most important figures and places in the work, and the issue of the Utopians' concept of warfare and punishment are going to be examined. By showing the contradiction between a name's translated meaning and the persons' character traits, and respectively between what is said and what is in fact done, the cause for distrust can be explained. Next, I will illustrate the resulting impacts not only on the trustworthiness of Utopia's narrator Raphael Hythloday, but also on the reliability of a possible similar existence of a society like the one he depicts. We will see that the dystopian facets which Thomas More included affect the perception and interpretation of his entire work, with a reader's reaction being determined by the binary structure and interplay of the aforementioned ambiguities, and his or her own capacity to decide how to deal with them. Finally, I will sum up both Utopia's positive as well as its negative sides; and I will look at other relevant dystopian elements and the work's inherent power which those two sides allow only due to their simultaneous existence.

Dystopian features in "Utopia" by Thomas More and their effects on reliability and perception

Dystopian features in Author: Manü Mohr
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3668603588
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 32

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2011 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 1,3, University of Stuttgart, language: English, abstract: This term paper will identify and analyse ambiguous or dystopian aspects in More's "Utopia". First of all, I will dwell upon the author's personal background and see to what extent and why his own vita can be recovered in several passages. As exemplification of such inconsistencies within this "perfect state", both the names of the most important figures and places in the work, and the issue of the Utopians' concept of warfare and punishment are going to be examined. By showing the contradiction between a name's translated meaning and the persons' character traits, and respectively between what is said and what is in fact done, the cause for distrust can be explained. Next, I will illustrate the resulting impacts not only on the trustworthiness of Utopia's narrator Raphael Hythloday, but also on the reliability of a possible similar existence of a society like the one he depicts. We will see that the dystopian facets which Thomas More included affect the perception and interpretation of his entire work, with a reader's reaction being determined by the binary structure and interplay of the aforementioned ambiguities, and his or her own capacity to decide how to deal with them. Finally, I will sum up both Utopia's positive as well as its negative sides; and I will look at other relevant dystopian elements and the work's inherent power which those two sides allow only due to their simultaneous existence.

Different Readings of Sir Thomas More’s Utopia - from an Ideal state to the First Dystopia

Different Readings of Sir Thomas More’s Utopia - from an Ideal state to the First Dystopia PDF Author: Jelena Vukadinovic
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3640314824
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 26

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2009 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 2,0, RWTH Aachen University (Institut für Anglistik), course: Utopian Novels, language: English, abstract: The aim of this paper is to point out some of the main trends in current criticism of More’s Utopia, by presenting and discussing some of the most important theses from the most representative critical writings from each of the aforementioned arches of interpretation. Special attention will be given to the question in how far it is justifiable to read Utopia as a negative concept, albeit even partly, or even as the first dystopia. In order to analyse this, a number of aspects has to be considered first. One has to differentiate between the questions of More’s intentions and modern readers’ point of view on the Utopian commonwealth. Even if More meant his island to be ideal and a blueprint for a new and better society, which is itself already very disputable, it does not necessarily mean that it can still be seen as such. Most modern reader cannot be expected to see Utopia as society which is anywhere near perfect or desirable. Values, of societies as well as individuals, have shifted in their meaning and focus between the era of Tudor England and today. It is also rather questionable in how far the utopian society would have appeared as ideal to More’s contemporaries, especially in regard to its communism and its religious practices.

Different Readings of Sir Thomas More's Utopia - from an Ideal State to the First Dystopi

Different Readings of Sir Thomas More's Utopia - from an Ideal State to the First Dystopi PDF Author: Jelena Vukadinovic
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3640318293
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 29

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2009 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 2,0, RWTH Aachen University (Institut für Anglistik), course: Utopian Novels, language: English, abstract: The aim of this paper is to point out some of the main trends in current criticism of More's Utopia, by presenting and discussing some of the most important theses from the most representative critical writings from each of the aforementioned arches of interpretation. Special attention will be given to the question in how far it is justifiable to read Utopia as a negative concept, albeit even partly, or even as the first dystopia. In order to analyse this, a number of aspects has to be considered first. One has to differentiate between the questions of More's intentions and modern readers' point of view on the Utopian commonwealth. Even if More meant his island to be ideal and a blueprint for a new and better society, which is itself already very disputable, it does not necessarily mean that it can still be seen as such. Most modern reader cannot be expected to see Utopia as society which is anywhere near perfect or desirable. Values, of societies as well as individuals, have shifted in their meaning and focus between the era of Tudor England and today. It is also rather questionable in how far the utopian society would have appeared as ideal to More's contemporaries, especially in regard to its communism and its religious practices.

Utopia and Anti-Utopia - A comparison of Thomas More’s Utopia and George Orwell’s 1984

Utopia and Anti-Utopia - A comparison of Thomas More’s Utopia and George Orwell’s 1984 PDF Author: Raoul Festante
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3638407063
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 23

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2003 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 1, University of Hannover (Englisches Seminar Universität Hannover), course: Utopias of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, language: English, abstract: n the following paper I want to examine the relationship between Thomas More ́s Utopia and George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. As both these texts offer a wealth of material for interpretation, I want to concentrate mainly on emphasizing the similarities in the desc ription of the political and social systems. I will attempt to underline these very essential resemblances by examining how life in Utopia differs from life in Nineteen Eighty-Four for the individual social being. After reading Utopia for the first time It seemed to me an important question to examine the world of Utopia from a different angle, by comparing it to the opposite, politically charged Anti-Utopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. In comparing these texts I began to ask myself if Thomas More was actually well ahead of his time in constructing the world of Utopia. Taking Orwell’s text into consideration, I felt that there was a striking similarity between the texts although they differed in their criticism and point of departure. What I want to explore in the following pages is to show how the political system of Utopia depends on an unyielding denial of human individuality, a denial that is an essential part of the ideology in Nineteen Eighty-Four. My main argument will be that Utopia is not the happy place it wants us to present, but a system of total control and oppression, very similar to Nineteen Eighty-Four. Although different in its overall impression, Utopia leaves a great deal of questions to the reader. The most striking one is, how the Utopia ns themselves evaluate the laws and rules of Utopia. Finally, I will attempt to emphasize the interrelationship and logical consequence of Anti-Utopia as a possible answer towards Utopian idealism.

Love in the Ruins

Love in the Ruins PDF Author: Walker Percy
Publisher: Open Road Media
ISBN: 1453216200
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 350

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Book Description
DIVDIV“A great adventure . . . So outrageous and so real, one is left speechless.” —Chicago Sun Times/divDIV/divDIVIn Walker Percy’s future America, the country is on the brink of disaster. With citizens violently polarized along racial, political, and social lines, and a fifteen-year war still raging abroad, America is crumbling quickly into ruin. The country’s one remaining hope is Dr. Thomas More, whose “lapsometer” is capable of diagnosing the spiritual afflictions—anxiety, depression, alienation—driving everyone’s destructive and disastrous behavior./divDIV /divDIVBut such a potent machine has its pitfalls. As Dr. More soon learns, in the wrong hands, the powerful lapsometer could lead to open warfare, pushing America into anarchy at full-speed./div /div

Swastika Night

Swastika Night PDF Author: Katharine Burdekin
Publisher: Feminist Press at CUNY
ISBN: 9780935312560
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
In a "feudal Europe seven centuries into post-Hitlerian society, Burdekin's novel explores the connection between gender and political power and anticipates modern feminist science fiction."--Cover.

Feed

Feed PDF Author: M.T. Anderson
Publisher: Candlewick Press
ISBN: 0763662623
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 321

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Book Description
Identity crises, consumerism, and star-crossed teenage love in a futuristic society where people connect to the Internet via feeds implanted in their brains. This new edition contains new back matter and a refreshed cover. A National Book Award finalist.

The Utopia of Rules

The Utopia of Rules PDF Author: David Graeber
Publisher: Melville House
ISBN: 1612193757
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
From the author of the international bestseller Debt: The First 5,000 Years comes a revelatory account of the way bureaucracy rules our lives Where does the desire for endless rules, regulations, and bureaucracy come from? How did we come to spend so much of our time filling out forms? And is it really a cipher for state violence? To answer these questions, the anthropologist David Graeber—one of our most important and provocative thinkers—traces the peculiar and unexpected ways we relate to bureaucracy today, and reveals how it shapes our lives in ways we may not even notice…though he also suggests that there may be something perversely appealing—even romantic—about bureaucracy. Leaping from the ascendance of right-wing economics to the hidden meanings behind Sherlock Holmes and Batman, The Utopia of Rules is at once a powerful work of social theory in the tradition of Foucault and Marx, and an entertaining reckoning with popular culture that calls to mind Slavoj Zizek at his most accessible. An essential book for our times, The Utopia of Rules is sure to start a million conversations about the institutions that rule over us—and the better, freer world we should, perhaps, begin to imagine for ourselves.

The New Utopian Politics of Ursula K. Le Guin's The Dispossessed

The New Utopian Politics of Ursula K. Le Guin's The Dispossessed PDF Author: Laurence Davis
Publisher: Lexington Books
ISBN: 0739158201
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 353

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Book Description
The Dispossessed has been described by political thinker Andre Gorz as 'The most striking description I know of the seductions—and snares—of self-managed communist or, in other words, anarchist society.' To date, however, the radical social, cultural, and political ramifications of Le Guin's multiple award-winning novel remain woefully under explored. Editors Laurence Davis and Peter Stillman right this state of affairs in the first ever collection of original essays devoted to Le Guin's novel. Among the topics covered in this wide-ranging, international and interdisciplinary collection are the anarchist, ecological, post-consumerist, temporal, revolutionary, and open-ended utopian politics of The Dispossessed. The book concludes with an essay by Le Guin written specially for this volume, in which she reassesses the novel in light of the development of her own thinking over the past 30 years.

An American Utopia

An American Utopia PDF Author: Fredric Jameson
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 1784784540
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 337

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Book Description
Controversial manifesto by acclaimed cultural theorist debated by leading writers Fredric Jameson’s pathbreaking essay “An American Utopia” radically questions standard leftist notions of what constitutes an emancipated society. Advocated here are—among other things—universal conscription, the full acknowledgment of envy and resentment as a fundamental challenge to any communist society, and the acceptance that the division between work and leisure cannot be overcome. To create a new world, we must first change the way we envision the world. Jameson’s text is ideally placed to trigger a debate on the alternatives to global capitalism. In addition to Jameson’s essay, the volume includes responses from philosophers and political and cultural analysts, as well as an epilogue from Jameson himself. Many will be appalled at what they will encounter in these pages—there will be blood! But perhaps one has to spill such (ideological) blood to give the Left a chance. Contributing are Kim Stanley Robinson, Jodi Dean, Saroj Giri, Agon Hamza, Kojin Karatani, Frank Ruda, Alberto Toscano, Kathi Weeks, and Slavoj Žižek.