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

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.