Utopia
Edited by Henry Morley
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Publisher Description
De Optimo Republicae Statu deque Nova Insula Utopia (translated
On the Best State of a Republic and on the New Island of Utopia)
or more simply Utopia is a 1516 book by Sir (Saint) Thomas
More.
In 1516 More wrote his most famous and controversial work, Utopia, a
novel wherein a traveller, Raphael Hythloday (in Greek, his name and surname
allude to archangel Raphael, purveyor of truth, and mean "speaker of nonsense"),
describes the political arrangements of the imaginary island country of Utopia
(Greek pun ou-topos [no place], eu-topos [good place]) to himself
and to Peter Giles. This novel presents the city of Amaurote as "of them all
this is the worthiest and of most dignity".
Utopia contrasts the contentious social life of European states with
the perfectly orderly, reasonable social arrangements of Utopia and its environs
(Tallstoria, Nolandia, and Aircastle). In Utopia, private property does not
exist, and there is almost complete religious toleration. The novel's principal
message is the social need for order and discipline, rather than liberty. The
country of Utopia tolerates different religious practices, but does not tolerate
atheists. More theorizes that if a man did not believe in a god or in an
afterlife he could never be trusted, because, logically, he would not
acknowledge any authority or principle outside himself.
-- Excerpted from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.