“The island of Utopia is in the
middle two hundred miles broad, and holds almost at the same breadth over a
great part of it, but it grows narrower towards both ends. Its figure is not
unlike a crescent. Between its horns the sea comes in eleven miles broad, and
spreads itself into a great bay, which is environed with land to the compass of
about five hundred miles, and is well secured from winds. In this bay there is no great current; the
whole coast is, as it were, one continued harbour, which gives all that live in
the island great convenience for mutual commerce. But the entry into the bay,
occasioned by rocks on the one hand and shallows on the other, is very
dangerous. In the middle of it there is one single rock which appears above
water, and may, therefore, easily be avoided; and on the top of it there is a
tower, in which a garrison is kept; the other rocks lie under water, and are
very dangerous. The channel is known only to the natives; so that if any stranger
should enter into the bay without one of their pilots he would run great danger
of shipwreck. For even they themselves could not pass it safe if some marks
that are on the coast did not direct their way; and if these should be but a
little shifted, any fleet that might come against them, how great soever it
were, would be certainly lost. On the other side of the island there are likewise
many harbours; and the coast is so fortified, both by nature and art, that a
small number of men can hinder the descent of a great army. But they report
(and there remains good marks of it to make it credible) that this was no
island at first, but a part of the continent. Utopus, that conquered it (whose
name it still carries, for Abraxa was its first name), brought the rude and
uncivilised inhabitants into such a good government, and to that measure of
politeness, that they now far excel all the rest of mankind. Having soon
subdued them, he designed to separate them from the continent, and to bring the
sea quite round them. To accomplish this he ordered a deep channel to be dug,
fifteen miles long; and that the natives might not think he treated them like
slaves, he not only forced the inhabitants, but also his own soldiers, to
labour in carrying it on. As he set a vast number of men to work, he, beyond
all men’s expectations, brought it to a speedy conclusion. And his neighbours,
who at first laughed at the folly of the undertaking, no sooner saw it brought
to perfection than they were struck with admiration and terror.” [Sir Saint Thomas More. Utopia (p. 45-6).
Kypros Press. Kindle Edition.]
The book was originally published in Latin in 1516, when
More was thirty-eight years old. It is
interesting and not surprising that so much literature of the time had to do
with remote countries and exotic people.
This book was published only twenty-four years from Columbus’ crossing
of the Atlantic. I wonder if More’s book
was the first such genre of literature. An
English translation was first published in 1551, some sixteen years after More’s
famous beheading.
###
Kerstin
Commented:
I suppose in those days
one could really let the fantasy roam and describe a place that was for all
intents and purposes terra incognita.
To me the description of
the island serves to point out how inaccessible and remote it is. Only in this
isolation a utopian society can emerge.
My
Reply:
Good point. I've been
trying to see if this genre has a name. I would call it Voyage Literature. Sort
of a voyage to a strange and exotic land. As I think of it, this genre has
never gone away. It's now voyaging to strange and exotic planets as part of
science fiction.
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