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Olesha's Zavist' : Utopia and Dystopia

1991; Cambridge University Press; Volume: 50; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2307/2499856

2325-7784

Milton Ehre,

Utopian, Dystopian, and Speculative Fiction

Utopia and dystopia designate the human dream of happiness and the human nightmare of despair when these are assigned a place (topos) in space or time. Since narrative literature "is essentially an imitation not of persons but of action and life, of happiness and misery," Utopian and dystopian inventions are mere extremes of literature's ongoing story. In realistic fictions, although social circumstances may range from the incidental to the decisive, the story of the movement to happiness or unhappiness is usually told in terms of individual achievement and failure. In the Utopian and anti-utopian scheme deliverance or damnation depend on the place where one has found oneself, whether it is "the good place" or "the bad place." Although Utopias are allegorical constructs of the rational mind, attempting to bring order to the disorder of life, their denial of what is for the sake of what ought to be makes them a species of fantasy literature–a dream of reason.