Routledge Library Editions Utopias

Routledge Library Editions: Utopias (6 volume set) contains titles, originally published between 1923 and 1982. It includes volumes focusing on Utopian fiction, both as a genre in its own right and also from a feminist perspective. In addition, there are sociological texts that examine the history of Utopian thought, from the writings of Plato and beyond, as well as specific examples of people who have tried to create Utopian communities.

Routledge Library Editions: Utopias (6 volume set) contains titles, originally published between 1923 and 1982. It includes volumes focusing on Utopian fiction, both as a genre in its own right and also from a feminist perspective. In addition, there are sociological texts that examine the history of Utopian thought, from the writings of Plato and beyond, as well as specific examples of people who have tried to create Utopian communities.

In this title, originally published in 1950, the author has set out to give a description and a critical assessment of the most important (not necessarily the most famous) Utopian writings since Plato first gave, in his Republic, a literary form to the dreams of a Golden Age and of ideal societies which had doubtless been haunting man since the beginning of the conscious discussion of social problems. It is more than a mere compilation and criticism of Utopias, it brings out in a striking way the close and fateful relationship between Utopian thought and social reality, and takes its place among the important books which had appeared in the previous few years, warning us, from various points of view, of the doom that awaits those who are foolish enough to put their trust in an ordered and regimented world.

This book, originally published in 1923, embodies two related and yet distinct types of sociological endeavour. It is a study in the history of social thought, a field which had only been receiving serious and widespread attention in recent years, and attempts to give an historical cross-section of representative Utopian thought at the time. But it is also a study in social idealism, a study in the origin, selection and potency of those social ideas and ideals that occasional and usually exceptional men conceive, with particular emphasis upon their relation to social progress. It was the first book that attempted to give an unprejudiced, systematic treatment of the social Utopias as a whole.

Utopian writing offers a fascinating panorama of social visions; and the related forms of dystopia and anti-utopian satire extend this into the range of social nightmares. Originally published in 1988, this comparative study of utopian fiction by British and American women writers demonstrates the continuity of a well-established, but little-known, tradition, emphasising its range and diversity, and providing ample evidence of women’s aspirations and documenting the restrictions and exclusions in private and public life that their novels challenge. Historically, the growth of each national tradition is traced in relation to social and political movements, particularly the suffrage movement and contemporary feminism. Comparatively, the quite different responses of British and American women to what are in many instances the same social problems are examine in the light of changing expectations. Definitions of human nature and gender relationships are assessed on a nature/culture continuum as a means of understanding this change. Women’s attitudes to their social and political roles, their working lives, to sexuality, marriage and the family are reflected in their visions of fruitful change; and so also is the impact of two world wars, socialism and fascism, the debate on peaceful uses of nuclear energy and fears of a nuclear holocaust.

This book, originally published in 1955 and reissued in 1973, is a study of the flourishing of an ancient literary form which had only recently been recognized and systematically studied as a proper genre – utopian fiction. Beginning with the imaginary journeys of writers like H. G. Wells at the end of the nineteenth century, Professor Gerber traces the evolving themes and forms of the genre through their culmination in the sophisticated nightmares of Aldous Huxley and George Orwell. It is a two-fold transformation: On the one hand, the optimism of social reformers whose visions of the future were nurtured by the theories of Darwin and the triumph of science and industry gradually gives way to the pessimism of moral philosophers alarmed at the power science and technology have put at the disposal of totalitarian rulers. On the other hand, the earlier writers’ dependence on framing and distancing devices for their stories and heavy emphasis on technical details give way to the subtlety of complex psychological novels whose artistry makes the reader a citizen of the tragic worlds depicted.

Originally published in 1966. The main purpose of this book is not philosophical speculation, but to draw the obvious conclusions from political and historical facts about the prospects and methods of human political survival. The central theme is developed in the context of problems which cause most anxiety today: the mounting arms race, the unstable balance of power, the rapid growth of population, racial conflicts and ideological incompatibilities.

This set of three previously out-of-print volumes collects together in one place key areas of research into the genre of science fiction. It critically examines science fiction, establishing its common themes and definitions, and comprehensively assesses the sci-fi world in its entirety.