Utopia?
Imagine it - utopia, a remote cabin on the beach, the kingship of a vast empire, Nirvana; Heaven, the Happy Hunting Grounds, paradise, perfection. What exactly is Utopia? According to Webster it is "1, an imaginary and indefinitely remote place" or " 2, often capitalized : a place of ideal perfection esp. in laws, government, and social conditions." Where is this perfect place? Will my dog live forever there? Will I never grow old? If I never grow old there does that mean I never mature? What if my idea of perfection differs from my neighbor there, will it still be perfect for both of us? Utopia is a nonexistent, but absolutely perfect place, as we can see from the beginning of the word in 1516 by Sir Thomas More. More was one of Henry VIII's main councilors. He fell out of favor with the king when he did not sign a letter urging the pope to divorce Henry and Catherine. He was imprisoned in the Tower of London because his going against the king was treason; he was beheaded. It is strange that a man with such a life, and such an end, was the creator of the perfect world as well as a commonly used word in our language. In his writings, utopia was a place of absolute perfection. He described a poor king who cared more a
bout the riches of his people than his own welfare, much different than the dystopia that he lived his life in. This utopia of More sounds very similar to that that Gonzalo speaks of in Shakespeare's Tempest "All things in common nature should produce without sweat or endeavor. Treason, felony, Sword, pike, knife, gun, or need for any engine Would I not have; but nature should bring forth of it own kind, all foison, all abundance, to feed my innocent people."(Shakespeare 334) There have been many attempted utopias. One of these can be seen in the book Brave New World. This book takes place on earth in the future. In this future everything is dominated by science and technology. There is no Religion or art. The directors of this new world have attempted to make a utopia in which people are predestined to fit into "their inescapable social destiny." They feel that this will be better for the people because they will not try for greater things and fail. The new world uses science to "stabilize" society by removing any possibility of free will. They train the people like dogs with "Neo-Pavlovian conditioning" as children. Their attempts at a utopia fail completely and result in total disaster or dystopia. The population is addicted to a drug that
Some common words found in the essay are:
Brave World, God Child, Beach Gattica, According Webster, Tower London, Shakespeare's Tempest, Vincent Irene, Henry VIII's, , Hunting Grounds, brave world, attempts utopia, absolute perfection, god child,
Approximate Word count = 852
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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