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Author Robertson, Michael (Professor of English), author

Title The last utopians : four late nineteenth-century visionaries and their legacy / Michael Robertson
Published Princeton : Princeton University Press, [2018]
©2018

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Description 1 online resource
Contents Introduction -- Locating Nowhere -- Edward Bellamy's Orderly Utopia -- William Morris's Artful Utopia -- Edward Carpenter's Homogenic Utopia -- Charlotte Perkins Gilman's Motherly Utopia -- After the Last Utopians
Summary The entertaining story of four utopian writers--Edward Bellamy, William Morris, Edward Carpenter, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman--and their continuing influence todayFor readers reared on the dystopian visions of Nineteen Eighty-Four and The Handmaid's Tale, the idea of a perfect society may sound more sinister than enticing. In this lively literary history of a time before "Orwellian" entered the cultural lexicon, Michael Robertson reintroduces us to a vital strain of utopianism that seized the imaginations of late nineteenth-century American and British writers. The Last Utopians delves into the biographies of four key figures--Edward Bellamy, William Morris, Edward Carpenter, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman--who lived during an extraordinary period of literary and social experimentation. The publication of Bellamy's Looking Backward in 1888 opened the floodgates of an unprecedented wave of utopian writing. Morris, the Arts and Crafts pioneer, was a committed socialist whose News from Nowhere envisions a workers' Arcadia. Carpenter boldly argued that homosexuals constitute a utopian vanguard. Gilman, a women's rights activist and the author of "The Yellow Wallpaper," wrote numerous utopian fictions, including Herland, a visionary tale of an all-female society. These writers, Robertson shows, shared a belief in radical equality, imagining an end to class and gender hierarchies and envisioning new forms of familial and romantic relationships. They held liberal religious beliefs about a universal spirit uniting humanity. They believed in social transformation through nonviolent means and were committed to living a simple life rooted in a restored natural world. And their legacy remains with us today, as Robertson describes in entertaining firsthand accounts of contemporary utopianism, ranging from Occupy Wall Street to a Radical Faerie retreat
Analysis Charles Fourier
Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Edward Bellamy
Edward Carpenter
Equality
Henri de Saint-Simon
Henry George
Herland
John Ruskin
Looking Backward
Nationalism
News from Nowhere
Progress and Poverty
Radical Faeries
Robert Owen
The Nature of Gothic
Thomas More
Towards Democracy
Uranians
Urning
Utopia
Walt Whitman
William Morris
World's Mother
community
economic equality
education
egalitarianism
everyday utopias
homogenic love
homosexuality
industrial capitalism
intermediate sex
labor
last utopians
literary dystopia
motherhood
mothers
progress
radical equality
religion
social thought
social transformation
socialism
sustainability
technology
transatlantic utopianism
universal spirit
utopia
utopian literature
utopianism
women
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes Online resource; title from PDF title page (EBSCO, viewed April 30, 2018)
Subject Bellamy, Edward, 1850-1898 -- Criticism and interpretation
Morris, William, 1834-1896 -- Criticism and interpretation
Carpenter, Edward, 1844-1929 -- Criticism and interpretation
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins, 1860-1935 -- Criticism and interpretation
SUBJECT Bellamy, Edward, 1850-1898 fast
Carpenter, Edward, 1844-1929 fast
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins, 1860-1935 fast
Morris, William, 1834-1896 fast
Subject Utopias in literature.
utopian literature.
BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY -- Literary.
Utopias in literature
Genre/Form Criticism, interpretation, etc.
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9781400889600
140088960X
Other Titles Four late nineteenth-century visionaries and their legacy
4 late nineteenth-century visionaries and their legacy
Four late 19th-century visionaries and their legacy
4 late 19th-century visionaries and their legacy