Time Asia — October 10, 2017

FIVE CLASSIC

UTOPIAN NOVELS

UTOPIA (1516)

BY THOMAS MORE

Most of this classic novel consists

of a secondhand account of the isle

of Utopia, where no one is exempt

from work, but labor is limited to six

hours a day and resources are shared.

Although it relies on little technological

advancement, it provided a formula for

the rest of the utopian genre.

THE BLAZING WORLD (1666)

BY MARGARET CAVENDISH

A young maiden drifts astray on a

lifeboat near the North Pole, only to

find herself transported to another

world, where she is crowned empress

and abolishes all forms of war and

discrimination. When she hears of

an attack on her home country of

England, she uses a fleet of submarines

to defeat the invaders.

LOOKING BACKWARD (1888)

BY EDWARD BELLAMY

The protagonist of this novel falls

asleep in 1887 and wakes up, Rip van

Winkle–like, after a 113-year nap.

The year 2000 brings not only early

retirement and quick delivery, but also

credit cards that provide equal credit

to all citizens and a justice system that

treats crime as a medical issue.

WALDEN TWO(1948)

BY B.F. SKINNER

Like their utopian forebears, the

behaviorally engineered denizens of

Walden Two get short workdays—as

well as the option to pick a new place

to work each day. Although outside

visitors are dubious of the society’s

perfection, they never find a definitive

crack in the facade.

PARABLE OF THE SOWER (1993)

BY OCTAVIA E. BUTLER

A more ambiguous novel for the

genre, its story begins in the 2020s

in a dystopian U.S. brought low by

climate change and corruption. A

young woman invents a belief system

and accrues followers to plan for a

new ideal society, which they hope to

establish on other planets.

walk the line between potential
positive and negative technological
outcomes is Daniel Suarez, a futurist
with a following in Silicon Valley.
He describes the world of his most
recent book,Change Agent, as a near
future where widespread black-market
genetic editing has created serious
problems. “But it is also a world where
countless heritable genetic disorders
have been cured and where both
industry and agriculture are being
made environmentally sustainable,”
he says. “Is that a dystopia? Is that a
utopia? Is it a mixture of both? I think
the future will look very much like
the present in that there will be both
good aspects and bad aspects, and our
challenge is to navigate the best path
between the two.” □