Utopia Essay

‘Central to a Utopian or Dystopian text is its ability to criticise and challenge the dominant ideologies of its society’. Discuss this statement in light of Sir Thomas More’s Utopia and another text of your own choosing. In your response make detailed references to forms, features, context and values of your texts.

Utopia by Thomas More and The Lost Thing by Shaun Tan, criticise and challenge the dominant ideologies of their society. Thomas More uses Utopia as a satirical text to criticise and challenge the corrupt society he lives in. Utopia was written during King Henry’s reign and anything that was obviously attacking the way King Henry ran the country would have been punishable by beheading. This didactic text criticises the political social system of the time, and points out the failings of this society in order to reform it, using the examples of the harshness of the criminal code, the polarisation of wealth and resources and the “idle nobles”. The Lost thing is a picture book that was written by Shaun Tan who attacks More’s idea of a homogenous society as well as attacking modern society for the effect that technology has on a blinded society.

In the novel Utopia, Sir Thomas More criticises the harshness of the criminal code used in England and the problems that this causes. Using the example of the death penalty, More uses the character “Raphael Hythloday” (meaning “talker of nonsense” in Greek) to show his disapproval of this method. Raphael says to the lawyer and the Cardinal, “As a punishment it’s too severe, and as a deterrent it’s quite ineffective.” (Page 22) and “So in our efforts to terrorize thieves we’re actually encouraging them to murder innocent people.” More states that if murder and petty larceny are given the same punishment, there will be a higher rate of murders because in the eyes of the law, both crimes are worth the same punishment. More suggests other methods of punishments by using a similar idea to the novel; creating civilisations to address the issues of his society.

Raphael criticises the “Idle Nobles” of the English society and uses the Utopian society as an example of how he believes the English society should act. He talks about how the nobles live off the labour of other people and then earn money by raising the rents to keep up with the extravagance that the noble’s lifestyle demands. “… lots of noblemen who live like drones on the labour of other people, in other words, of their tenants , and keep bleeding them white by constantly raising their rents.” More comments on how nobles do nothing for society except by doing it harm. He is effective at using exaggerating and satirical language to point out the flaws of the English Nobles, at the same time he creates a social distance, placing the blame on a fictional character.

More uses the example of the Flatulentine’s, when they come to Utopia. They dress up in fine clothes and cover themselves with jewels and precious metals. But the Utopian’s found that what they were wearing was ridiculous. “In fact they were fully equipped with all the things used in Utopia for punishing slaves, humiliating criminals, or amusing small children.” (Page 68.) More uses this example to attack the ostentatious and greedy ways of the nobles by using Raphael as a mouthpiece for his opinions. More uses this hyperbole to point out the ridiculousness of the importance English Nobles have placed on wealth, appearances and more material things, rather than more practical things such as iron.

Shaun Tan uses the effective imagery of direct references to Utopia to highlight the flaws of having a homogenous society. It attacks Utopia by showing how bland and monotonous society is when everything looks the same. Tan is trying to show that when everything looks the same, all of the important things in life disappear. By using visual representation, the responders can see that the ‘perfect homogenous society’ does not exist. Tan uses the word Utopia in the image of the monotonous society and again in the colourful picture of the Lost Things to represent that Utopia and the idea of a perfect society is different for everyone.

The Lost Thing attacks a world that Shaun Tan sees as becoming blinded by an overindustrialised society and is being consumed by the media and therefore cannot see the little things in life, which has been represented by ‘Lost things’. Tan uses the background image of the collage to show how too much pointless information can distract from the important things in life. “My parents didn’t really notice it at first. Too busy discussing current events, I guess.” Tan is using irony in this example and this is seen through the image in which the parents are completely ignorant of the 'Lost Thing', even though it is very large in size, because they have been distracted by the television and newspaper displaying pointless current events. Tan shows how quickly the people of this society are distracted. “‘It’s lost,’ I said, but they had already started talking about something else.” Tan continues this line of argument throughout the entire book, using images such as the statues having ‘box-heads’ to represent being influenced by the media only.

Utopia and The Lost Thing are effective in their techniques to criticise and challenge the dominant ideologies of their societies. By using techniques such as satire and hyperboles, Utopia is able to attack the issues of More’s society effectively and suggest ways to reform the society while creating enough social distance so that More will not be suspected of treason. The Lost Thing uses visual representations and hyperboles to criticise the homogenous society of More’s Utopia as well as the blinded and overwhelmed technologically advanced society of today.