The Utopian Dilemma in the Western Political Imagination

In this volume, John Farrell shows that political utopias have a perennial opponent, the honor-based culture of aristocracy that dominated most of the world from ancient times into early modernity and whose status-based competitive psychology persists to the present day.

List of contents

Introduction: Imagining a World Without Heroes
1/ The Hero and the City: Homer to Diogenes
2/ Thomas More's Imaginary Kingdom
3/ Francis Bacon and the Heroism of the Age
4/ Jonathan Swift and Utopian Madness
5/ Voltaire's Garden Retreat
6/ Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the Land of Chimaeras
7/ Adam Smith and the Utopia of Commercial Society
8/ Karl Marx and the Heroic Revolution
9/ Fyodor Dostoevsky and the Ungrateful Biped
10/ Edward Bellamy's Invisible Army
11/ William Morris and the Taming of Art
12/ H. G. Wells and the Samurai
13/ Charlotte Perkins Gilman and the Mothers' Utopia
14/ Yevgeny Zamyatin and the Scythian Horde
15/ Aldous Huxley and the Rebels Against Happiness
16/ George Orwell's Dystopian Socialism
17/ B. F. Skinner's World Without Heroes
18/ Anthony Burgess and the Revenge of the Dandy
Conclusion

About the author

John Farrell is the Waldo W. Neikirk Professor of Literature at Claremont McKenna College, where he has been teaching since 1990.

Summary

In this volume, John Farrell shows that political utopias have a perennial opponent, the honor-based culture of aristocracy that dominated most of the world from ancient times into early modernity and whose status-based competitive psychology persists to the present day.

Product details

• Authors: John Farrell, Farrell John
• Publisher: Taylor and Francis
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 04.10.2024
• EAN: 9781032431581
• ISBN: 978-1-032-43158-1
• No. of pages: 226
• Weight: 360 g
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative literary studies; PHILOSOPHY / Social, PHILOSOPHY / Political, LITERARY CRITICISM / Comparative Literature, Comparative Literature, Social & political philosophy, social and political philosophy, Literature: history & criticism