DOCSLIB.ORG

"News from Nowhere, the Time Machine" and the Break-Up of Classical Realism Author(S): Patrick Parrinder Source: Science Fiction Studies, Vol

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
SF-TH Inc "News from Nowhere, the Time Machine" and the Break-Up of Classical Realism Author(s): Patrick Parrinder Source: Science Fiction Studies, Vol. 3, No. 3, Science Fiction before Wells (Nov., 1976), pp. 265-274 Published by: SF-TH Inc Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4239042 . Accessed: 28/08/2014 12:22 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. SF-TH Inc is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Science Fiction Studies. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 131.111.184.22 on Thu, 28 Aug 2014 12:22:23 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THEBREAK-UP OF CLASSICALREALISM 265 and Mythmakers:1877-1938," in Challengesin AmericanCulture, ed. Ray B. Browneet al. (US 1970),pp 150-77;two articlesby FranzRottensteiner, "Kurd Lasswitz, a GermanPioneer of Science Fiction,"in SF: 7he OtherSide of Realism,ed. ThomasD. Clareson(US 1971), pp 289-306,and "Ordnungsliebendim Weltraum:Kurd Lasswitz," in Polaris 1, ed. Rotten- steiner (1973);and Klaus Gunther Just, "Ueber Kurd Lasswitz,"in Aspekte der Zukunft (Bern 1972),pp 32-65,which subsumes two earlieressays on Lasswitz. 12.One might well speculate that Golden-AgeAnglo-American SF profitedfrom Ger- many's loss. In effect it was left to Anglo-Americanwriters to explore the implicationsof modernphysics and the Germanrocket researchof the twentiesand thirties.In doing so they had the assistanceof Germanemigres like WillyLey, an admirerof Lasswitz,who underother circumstancesmight well have contributedas a writerand criticto a GoldenAge of German SF. PatrickParrinder News from Nowhere, The TimeMachine and the Break-Upof ClassicalRealism Critics of SF are understandablyconcerned with the integrityof the genre they study. Yet it is a commonplacethat majorworks are oftenthe fruitof an interaction of literarygenres, broughtabout by particularhistorical pressures. Novels such as Don Quixote,Madame Bouary and Ulysses may be read as symptomsof cultural upheaval,parodying and rejectingwhole classes of earlierfiction. My purposeis to suggest how this principlemight be appliedin the fieldof utopiaand SF. WhileMor- ris's News from Nowhere and Wells's The Time Machine have many generic antecedents, their historicalspecificity will be revealedas that of conflictingand yet related responses to the break-upof classicalrealism at the end of the nine- teenth century.1 Patrick Brantlingerdescribes News from Nowhere in a recent essay2 as "a conscious anti-novel,hostile to virtuallyevery aspect of the great traditionof Vic- torianfiction." In a mutedsense, such a commentmight seem self-evident;Morris's book is an acknowledgedmasterpiece of the "romance"genre which came to the fore as a consciousreaction against realistic fiction after about 1880.Yet News from Nowhere is radicallyunlike the work of RiderHaggard, R.L. Stevenson or their fellow-romancersin being a near-didacticexpression of left-wingpolitical beliefs. WilliamMorris was a Communist,so that it is interestingto considerwhat might have been his reactionto Engels'letter to MargaretHarkness (1888), with its un- favorablecontrast of the "pointblank socialist novel"or "Tendenzroman"to the "realism"of Balzac: That Balzacthus was compelledto go againsthis own class sympathiesand political prejudices, that he saw the necessityof the downfallof his favouritenobles, and described them as people deservingno betterfate; and that he saw the realmen of the futurewhere, for the timebeing, they alone were to be found-that I considerone of the greatesttriumphs of Realism,and one of the grandestfeatures in old Balzac.3 It is not clear from the wording(the letter was writtenin English)whether Engels saw Balzac's far-sightednessas a logical or an accidentalproduct of the Realist movement which in his day extended to Flaubert,Zola, Turgenev,Tolstoy and George Eliot. Engels' disparagementof Zola in this letter has led many Marxists This content downloaded from 131.111.184.22 on Thu, 28 Aug 2014 12:22:23 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 266 SCIENCE-FICTIONSTUDIES to endorse Balzac'stechnical achievement as a realistat the expense of his succes- sors. Yet the passage might also be read as a tribute to Balzac's social under- standingand politicalintegrity, without reference to any of the formaldoctrines of realism.What is certainis that the "triumph"Balzac secured for the Realistschool was in parta personal,moral triumph, based on his abilityto discardhis prejudices and see the true facts. Engels'sstatement seems to drawon two senses of the term "realism,"both of which originatedin the nineteenthcentury. Nor, I think,is this coincidence of literaryand politicalvaluations accidental. The fictionof Stendhal, Balzac and Flaubertin particularis characterizedby the systematicunmasking of bourgeois and romantic attitudes. In their politicaldimension, these novelists inherita traditionof analysisgoing back to Machiavelli,and which is most evident in Stendhal,who was not a professionalwriter but an ex-administratorand diplo- mat. Harry Levin defines the realismof these novelists as a critical,negational mode in which "the truth is approximatedby means of a satiricaltechnique, by unmaskingcant or debunkingcertain misconceptions."4 There are two processes suggested here: the writer'sown rejectionof cant and ideology,and his "satirical technique."Both are common to many SF novels, includingThe Time Machine, althoughin terms of representationalidiom these are the opposite of "realistic" works. News from Nowhere, on the other hand, is the utopianmasterpiece of a writerwho in his life went againsthis class sympathiesand joinedthe "realmen of the future,"as Balzac did by implicationin his books. Morrishas this in common with Engels (who distrustedhim personally).Hostile criticshave seen his socialist works as merelya transpositionof the longingsfor beauty,chivalry and vanquished greatness which inform his early poetry. As literarycriticism this seems to me shallow. Nor do Morris'spolitical activities provide evidence of poetic escapism or refusalto face the facts. It was not by courtesythat he was eventuallymourned as one of the stalwartsof the socialistmovement.5 On the surface,News from Nowhere (1890)was a response to a utopiaby a fellow-socialist-EdwardBellamy's Looking Backward, published two yearsearlier. Morrisreviewed it in The Commonweal,the weeklypaper of the SocialistLeague, on 22 June 1889.He was appalledby the servilityof Bellamy'svision of the corporate state, and felt that the book was politicallydangerous. He also noticed the sub- jectivity of the utopian form, its element of self-revelation.Whatever Bellamy's intentions,his book was the expression of a typicallyPhilistine, middle-class out- look. News from Nowhere was intended to provide a dynamic alternativeto Bellamy'smodel of socialist aspiration;a dream or vision which was ideologically superior as well as creative, organic and emotionallyfulfilling where Bellamy's was industrialized,mechanistic and stereotyped.Morris was strikinglysuccessful in these aims.IThe conviction and resonanceof his "utopianromance" speak, how- ever, of deeper causes than the stimulusprovided by Bellamy. News from Nowhere is constructed around two basic images or topoi: the miraculoustranslation of the narratorinto a better future (contrastedwith the long historicalstruggle to buildthat future,as describedin the chapter"How the ChangeCame"), and the journeyup the Thames,which becomes a richlynostalgic passage towards an uncomplicatedhappiness-a happiness which proves to be a mirage,and which authorand readercan only aspireto in the measurein which they take up the burdenof the present. Only the firstof these topoi is paralleled in Bellamy.The second points in a quite differentdirection. News from Nowhere is a dream taking place within a frame of mundanepolitical life-the meeting at which "therewere six persons present, and consequentlysix sections of the party were represented, four of which had strong but divergentAnarchist opinions" (?1). The dream is only potentiallya symbol of reality,since there is no pseudo- scientific "necessity"that things will evolve in this way. The frame occasions a gentle didacticism(in dreams begin responsibilities),but also a degree of self- This content downloaded from 131.111.184.22 on Thu, 28 Aug 2014 12:22:23 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THEBREAK-UP OF CLASSICALREALISM 267 consciousnessabout the narrativeart. "Guest,"the narrator,is both a thirdperson ("ourfriend") and Morrishimself; the change from third-to first-personnarration is made at the end of the opening chapter. Morris'ssubtitle, furthermore, refers to the story as a "UtopianRomance." Many objections which have been made to the book reflectthe reader'sdiscomfiture when asked to seriouslyimagine a world in which enjoymentand leisure are not paid for in the coin of other people's op- pression and suffering.It could be arguedthat Morrisshould not have attempted it--any more than Milton in Paradise Lost should have attempted the task of justifyingthe ways of God to men. Morris,however, held a view of
Load more

Recommended publications
  • 'William Morris
    B .-e~ -. : P R I C E T E N CENTS THE NEW ORDER SERIES: NUMBER ONE ‘William Morris CRAFTSMAN, WRITER AND SOCIAL RBFORM~R BP OSCAR LOVELL T :R I G G S PUBLISHED BY THE OSCAR L. TRIGGS PUBLISHING COMPANY, S58 DEARBORN STREET, CHICAGO, ILL. TRADE SUPPLIED BY THE WESTERN NRWS COMIPANY, CHICAGO TEN TEN LARGE VOLUMES The LARGE VOLUMES Library dl University Research RELIGION, PHILOSOPHY SOCIOLOGY, SCIENCE HISTORY IN ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS The Ideas That Have Influenced Civilization IN THE ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS Translated and Arranged in Chronological or Historical Order, so that Eoglish Students may read at First Hand for Themselves OLIVER J. THATCHER, Ph. D. Dcparfmmt of Hisfory, University of Chicago, Editor in Chid Assisted by mme than 125 University Yen, Specialists in their own fields AN OPINION I have purchased and examined the Documents of the ORIGINAL RESEARCH LIBRARY edited by Dr. Thatcher and am at once impressed with the work as an ex- ceedingly valuable publication, unique in kind and comprehensive in scope. ./ It must prove an acquisition to any library. ‘THOMAS JONATHAN BURRILL. Ph.D., LL.D., V&e-Pres. of the University of NZinois. This compilation is uniquely valuable for the accessi- bility it gives to the sources of knowledge through the use of these widely gathered, concisely stated, con- veniently arranged, handsomely printed and illustrated, and thoroughly indexed Documents. GRAHAM TAYLOR, LL.D., Director of The Institute of Social Science at fhe Universify of Chicago. SEND POST CARD FOR TABLE OF CONTENTS UNIVERSITY RESEARCH EXTENSION AUDITORIUM BUILDING, CHICAGO TRIGGS MAGAZINE A MAGAZIiVE OF THE NEW ORDER IN STATE, FAMILY AND SCHOOL Editor, _ OSCAR LOVELL TRIGGS Associates MABEL MACCOY IRWIN LEON ELBERT LANDONE ‘rHIS Magazine was founded to represent the New Spirit in literature, education and social reform.
    [Show full text]
  • The Journal of William Morris Studies
    The Journal of William Morris Studies volume xx, number 3, winter 2013 Editorial – Fears and Hopes Patrick O’Sullivan 3 William Morris and Robert Browning Peter Faulkner 13 Two Williams of one medieval mind: reading the Socialist William Morris through the lens of the Radical William Cobbett David A. Kopp 31 Making daily life ‘as useful and beautiful as possible’: Georgiana Burne-Jones and Rottingdean, 1880–1904 Stephen Williams 47 William Morris: An Annotated Bibliography 2010–2011 David and Sheila Latham 66 Reviews. Edited by Peter Faulkner Michael Rosen, ed, William Morris, Poems of Protest (David Goodway) 99 Ingrid Hanson, William Morris and the Uses of Violence, 1856–1890 (Tony Pinkney) 103 The Journal of Stained Glass, vol. XXXV, 2011, Burne-Jones Special Issue. (Peter Faulkner) 106 the journal of william morris studies . winter 2013 Rosie Miles, Victorian Poetry in Context (Peter Faulkner) 110 Talia SchaVer, Novel Craft (Phillippa Bennett) 112 Glen Adamson, The Invention of Craft (Jim Cheshire) 115 Alec Hamilton, Charles Spooner (1862–1938) Arts and Crafts Architect (John Purkis) 119 Clive Aslet, The Arts and Crafts Country House: from the archives of Country Life (John Purkis) 121 Amy Woodhouse-Boulton, Transformative Beauty. Art Museums in Industrial Britain; Katherine Haskins, The Art Journal and Fine Art Publishing in Vic- torian England, 1850–1880 (Peter Faulkner) 124 Jonathan Meades, Museum without walls (Martin Stott) 129 Erratum 133 Notes on Contributors 134 Guidelines for Contributors 136 issn: 1756–1353 Editor: Patrick O’Sullivan ([email protected]) Reviews Editor: Peter Faulkner ([email protected]) Designed by David Gorman ([email protected]) Printed by the Short Run Press, Exeter, UK (http://www.shortrunpress.co.uk/) All material printed (except where otherwise stated) copyright the William Morris Society.
    [Show full text]
  • 2018 Annual Report
    2A018 nnual Report Details Trustees, staff and volunteers The William Morris Society PRESIDENT WMS VOLUNTEER ROLES Registered address: Jan Marsh (to 12 May 2018) Journal Editor: Owen Holland Kelmscott House Lord Sawyer of Darlington (from 12 May 2018) Magazine Editor: Susan Warlow 26 Upper Mall Librarian: Penny Lyndon Hammersmith TRUSTEES Journal Proofreader: Lauren McElroy London W6 9TA Martin Stott, Chair (to 12 May 2018) Stephen Bradley, Chair (from 12 May 2018) The William Morris Society is extremely Tel: 020 8741 3735 Rebecca Estrada-Pintel, Vice Chair fortunate to be able to draw on a wide range Email: [email protected] Andrew Gray, Treasurer of expertise and experience from our www.williammorrissociety.org Natalia Martynenko-Hunt, Secretary volunteers, who contribute many hundreds of Philip Boot (from 12 May 2018) hours of their time to help with welcoming TheWilliamMorrisSociety Jane Cohen visitors to the museum, delivering education @WmMorrisSocUK Serena Dyer (to 12 May 2018) sessions to schools and families, giving printing williammorrissocietyuk Michael Hall demonstrations, answering enquiries, Kathy Haslam (to 12 May 2018) cataloguing and caring for our collections, Registered Charity number 1159382 Jane Ibbunson (from 12 May 2018) office administration, serving refreshments and Fiona Rose maintaining our garden. John Stirling (from 12 May 2018) We are grateful to all who give up their time The Trustee Board operates through five to help with the work of the Society. committees. These are: Finance and General
    [Show full text]
  • William Morris and the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings: Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Historic Preservation in Europe
    Western Michigan University ScholarWorks at WMU Dissertations Graduate College 6-2005 William Morris and the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings: Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Historic Preservation in Europe Andrea Yount Western Michigan University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/dissertations Part of the European History Commons, and the History of Art, Architecture, and Archaeology Commons Recommended Citation Yount, Andrea, "William Morris and the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings: Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Historic Preservation in Europe" (2005). Dissertations. 1079. https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/dissertations/1079 This Dissertation-Open Access is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate College at ScholarWorks at WMU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks at WMU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. WILLIAM MORRIS AND THE SOCIETY FOR THE PROTECTION OF ANCIENT BUILDINGS: NINETEENTH AND TWENTIETH CENTURY IDSTORIC PRESERVATION IN EUROPE by Andrea Yount A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of The Graduate College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of History Dale P6rter, Adviser Western Michigan University Kalamazoo, Michigan June 2005 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. NOTE TO USERS This reproduction is the best copy available. ® UMI Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. UMI Number: 3183594 Copyright 2005 by Yount, Andrea Elizabeth All rights reserved. INFORMATION TO USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted.
    [Show full text]
  • Inhuman Power: Infrastructural Modernism and the Fiction of Social Form
    University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2019 Inhuman Power: Infrastructural Modernism And The Fiction Of Social Form Natalie Amleshi University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Modern Literature Commons, and the Other History Commons Recommended Citation Amleshi, Natalie, "Inhuman Power: Infrastructural Modernism And The Fiction Of Social Form" (2019). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 3442. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/3442 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/3442 For more information, please contact [email protected]. Inhuman Power: Infrastructural Modernism And The Fiction Of Social Form Abstract E.M. Forster’s imperative to “only connect” has long been read as modernist slogan for the rarefied depth of authentic interpersonal intimacy. Reframing the historical co-emergence of literary modernism and modern social science, this project tells a different story—not of connections between exceptional humans, but of connections between persons and environments. The prevailing canons of modernism have not yet grasped the internal complexity of early-twentieth-century debates regarding the interdependence of human and nonhuman agency. Early-twentieth-century sociologists like Émile Durkheim grounded both the autonomy of human culture and the disciplinary authority of sociology on the premise of species exceptionalism—the independence
    [Show full text]
  • Special Issue on William Morris
    SPECIAL ISSUE ON WILLIAM MORRIS SOCIALIST STUDIES/ÉTUDES SOCIALISTES SPRING 2018. Vol. 13 (1) TABLE OF CONTENTS Special Issue: William Morris Front Matter Sandra Rein 1 Articles Introduction 2 Paul Leduc Browne Work, Freedom and Reciprocity in William Morris' News from Nowhere 5 Paul Leduc Browne William Morris and the "Moral Qualities" of Ornament 23 Nicholas Frankel Reinventing Socialist Education: William Morris’s Kelmscott Press 36 Michelle Weinroth Comment Morrisian Spectres of Working and Learning in the Context of "The New 57 Division of Labour" Jason Camlot William Morris, Use Value and “Joyful Labour” 67 Colin Peter Mooers Building on William Morris' News from Nowhere 73 Leo Panitch Coda 78 Michelle Weinroth Instructions for Authors 82 Socialist Studies/Études socialistes is a peer-reviewed, interdisciplinary and open-access journal with a focus on describing and analysing social, economic and/or political injustice, and practices of struggle, transformation, and liberation. Socialist Studies/Études socialistes is indexed in EBSCO Publishing, Left Index and the Wilson Social Sciences Full Text databases and is a member of the Canadian Association of Learned Journals (CALJ). Socialist Studies/Études socialistes is published by the Society for Socialist Studies. The Society for Socialist Studies (SSS) is an association of progressive academics, students, activists and members of the general public. Formed in 1966, the Society’s purpose is to facilitate and encourage research and analysis with an emphasis on socialist, feminist, ecological, and anti- racist points of view. The Society for Socialist Studies is an independent academic association and is not affiliated with any political organization or group.
    [Show full text]
  • HG Wells and Dystopian Science Fiction by Gareth Davies-Morris
    The Sleeper Stories: H. G. Wells and Dystopian Science Fiction by Gareth Davies-Morris • Project (book) timeline, Fall 2017 • Wells biography • Definitions: SF, structuralism, dystopia • “Days to Come” (models phys. opps.) • “Dream of Arm.” (models int. opps.) • When the Sleeper Wakes • Intertextuality: Sleeper vs. Zemiatin’s We • Chapter excerpt Herbert George Wells (1866-1946) The legendary Frank R. Paul rendered several H. G. Wells narratives as covers for Hugo Gernsback’s influential pulp magazine Amazing Stories, which reprinted many of Wells’s early SF works. Clockwise from top: “The Crystal Egg” (1926), “In the Abyss” (1926), The War of the Worlds (1927), and When the Sleeper Wakes (1928) Frank R. Paul, cover paintings for Amazing Stories, 1926-1928. “Socialism & the Irrational” -- Wells-Shaw Conference, London School of Economics Fall 2017 Keynote: Michael Cox Sci-Fi artwork exhibit at the Royal Albert Hall! Fabian stained -glass window in LSE “Pray devoutly, hammer stoutly” Gareth with Professor Patrick Parrinder of England’s U. of Reading • Studied at the Normal School (now Imperial College London) with T.H. Huxley. • Schoolteacher, minor journalist until publication of The Time Machine (1895). • By 1910, known worldwide for his “scientific romances” and sociological forecasting. • By the 1920s, syndicated journalist moving in the highest social circles in England and USA. • Met Lenin, Stalin, and several US Presidents. • Outline of History (1920) a massive best-seller. • World State his philosophical goal; Sankey Declaration/UN
    [Show full text]
  • Hope and Change: Teaching News from Nowhere Religion, with Morris Advocating That We All Must Live Our Lives As Artists: ‘The Repulsion to Pessimism
    Hope and Change: Teaching News from Nowhere David Latham MY FIRST EXPERIENCE with teaching News from Nowhere was not at all what I expected. I had scheduled the book as the final text on our Victorian literature course, one intended to provide an inspirational resolution to the complex problems raised through-out the course. Earlier in the year we had read ‘The Defence of Guenevere’ and ‘King Arthur’s Tomb,’ poems about the triangular love relationships that lead to the decay of Camelot, a Celtic version of the fall from paradise and the hell that follows. With each poem and novel during that year I would repeatedly emphasize that the archetypal fall from paradise is one that each generation experiences, as most of us fall too quickly from hope and idealism to cynicism and despair, a fall that signals our transition from growth to death. The cynical attitude is the resort of those who are too lazy to struggle for more growth and who thus begin dying in their youth. News from Nowhere would provide the antidote; it would inspire us to strive towards the restoration of paradise. But I was not prepared for the depth of cynicism in the class. The students rolled their eyes at the naivety of Morris’s dream: ‘He can’t be serious; it’s Nowhere because it will never work; even the sunny weather would scorch the earth; I mean, get real.’ Though I had defined the mythical fall as a generational fall from the short growth of youth to the lengthy decay of death, I had overlooked the subtle ways each generation may experience the fall differently.
    [Show full text]
  • English Literature in Past Times
    International Journal of Academic Multidisciplinary Research (IJAMR) ISSN: 2643-9670 Vol.5 Issue 5, May – 2021, Pages: 71-73 English literature in past times 1Gulmira Juraboyeva and 2Dinara Saydullayeva Lutfulla qizi 1Student of Samarkand state institute of foreign languages +998979214973 [email protected] 2Student of National University of Uzbekistan named after Mirzo Ulugbek +998935531901 Abstract: In general, literature can function as the mirror that reflects the society. The world has been a subject to a large number of wars and battles. Specifically, the Second World War was a major destructive conflict that has left its effects on the international level. Since war existed, there have been many writers trying creatively to explore it in a way of turning the battlegrounds into influential narratives. In this regard, numerous British authors of post- WWII era have been attracted to respond to the Second World War in their post-war fiction in order to portray its barbarism and devastation. Keywords: literature, Herbert George Wells, genres, works, affection. Introduction In fact, in the aftermath of World War the British society witnessed a series of social changes that dramatically lead to general feeling of disillusionment and uncertainty. Consequently, post-World War British writers took it upon themselves to create narratives that investigate in sometimes a philosophical manner the damages of war and its impact on individuals. Among the writers of post-World war era is Herbert George Wells who is one the greatest contemporary authors. Undoubtedly, war and literature are inseparable. Numerous literary texts were written in order to respond to the wars and to trace its impacts on the individual’s sense of existence.
    [Show full text]
  • News from Nowhere and Victorian Socialist-Feminism
    News From Nowhere and Victorian Socialist-Feminism Florence S. Boos and William Boos The 1880's, a decade of explosive growth and organization for British socialism, alSQ witnessed the birth of socialist feminism; a con· fluence of radical visions which troubled as well as excited contem· porary socialists, and inspired a newarrayof analyses of contemporary evils, and projections of an ideal family and personal life. It is difficult, however, to find a fully socialist-feminist nineteenth century English­ language utopia; neither Mizora, Mary Bradley Lane's 1881 American radical separatistutopia, nor the 1888 Margllret Dunmore: Or, A Socialist Home, Jane Clapperton's English celebration of shared labour within voluntary "family" units, directly confronted the issues of capitalism or economic inequality. William Morris' News from Nowhere contained a self-conscious response to socialist-feminist debates of its period, and in. conjunction with his other narratives of the late 1880's (The Pilgrims of Hope, The House of the Wolfings, Ilnd The Roots of the Mountllins) offered one of the period's more sustained attempts to conceive a mutually-satisfying socialist erotic ideal. Though socialist-feminist in only some respects, News from Nowhere Was also distinctive for its sympathetic and exten­ sive consideration of topics unexplored in earlier utopian works. Morris' reconstructions of the historically specific early-medieval war­ rior societies of Wolfings and Roots imposed greater restrictions on their ranges of male and female social roles, so that News from Nowhere represented a high-point of Morris' projections of sexual equality. Morris would have been interested in socialist debates dUring the 1880's aboutwomen'srolesand sexual relations for several reasons.
    [Show full text]
  • Utopia: an Idea-Centered Activity for Accelerated
    UTOPIA: AN IDEA-CENTERED ACTIVITY FOR ACCELERATED TWELFTH GRADE STUEBNTS THESIS Presented to the Graduate Council of the North Texas State University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of MASTER Of AITS By Mary F. Mull, B. S., M. E, if Denton, Texas January, 1970 TOCFIAl AH IEBA-CENTERED ACTIVITY FOR ACCELERATED TWELFTH GRACE STUDENTS APPROVED? <r.. ex. f Major Professor Director of th# Department of English Dean of the Graduate School TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I, INTRODUCTION 1 11. SIR THCMAS MQRB'S UTOPIA 9 III. THE UTOPIA OF B. F. SKimmM . 33 IV. EVALUATION. 62 BIBLIOGRAPHY 63 lii CHAPTER I INTR ODUCT ION Through the apis dissatisfaction with his environment has provoked man to envision th« ideal oar "Utopian" setting which would be more to his liking. The discontent of today's youth with the world it has inherited echoes the com- plaints of past generations and yet is of particular signifi- cance and relevance to the twelfth grade student soon to enter the college community where protests are becoming in- creasingly more articulate and effective. Established insti- tutions and behavior codes are challenged with impunity although critics charge that such dissent is irresponsible and unsupported by positive, alternative proposals for im- provement . English teachers have long suspected that the unsatis- factory mastery of language skills may be partially attributed to the fact that students quite simply have nothing to say. Language is, after all, a vehicle for the communication of thought rarely stimulated by the well-worn topics presented futilely though faithfully to students year after year.
    [Show full text]
  • The Meaning of Work in a Sustainable Society Was Originally Published in English by Monthly Review in September 2017
    The Jus Semper Global Alliance Living Wages North and South Sustainable Human Development June 2019 ESSAYS ON TRUE DEMOCRACY AND CAPITALISM Th e M e a n i n g o f Wo r k i n a Sustainable Society Fie upon this quiet life. I want work. William Shakespeare, Henry IV, Part I, Act II, Scene IV John Bellamy Foster The nature and meaning of work, as it pertains to a future society, has deeply divided ecological, socialist, utopian, and Romantic thinkers since the Industrial Revolution.1 Some radical theorists have seen a more just society as merely requiring the rationalisation of present-day work relations, accompanied by increased leisure time and more equitable distribution. Others have focused on the need to transcend the entire system of alienated labour and make the development of creative work relations the central element of a new revolutionary society. In what appears to be an effort to circumvent this enduring conflict, current visions of sustainable prosperity, while not denying the necessity of work, often push it into the background, placing their emphasis instead on an enormous expansion of leisure hours.2 Increased non-work time seems an unalloyed good, and is easily imaginable in the context of a no-growth society. In contrast, the very question of work is fraught with inherent difficulties, since it goes to the roots of the current socioeconomic system, its division of labour, and its class relations. Yet it remains the case that no coherent ecological mapping of a sustainable future is conceivable without addressing the issue of homo faber, i.e., the creative, constructive, historical role in the transformation of nature, and hence the social relation to nature, that distinguishes humanity as a species.
    [Show full text]