This document provides an overview of utopian and dystopian fiction. It defines utopia as an imagined perfect society and dystopia as an imagined place where people are unhappy and usually not free. It describes characteristics of each genre, such as utopias featuring equality and education while dystopias are typically oppressive societies with restricted freedom. Examples of famous works of both utopian and dystopian fiction are also outlined.
2. Prepared by :- Nidhi Jethava
Batch :- 20-22 MKBU English Department
Paper :- 109, Literary theory & Criticism and Indian Aesthetics
Roll Number :- 13
Enrollment Number :- 30692064200009
Email Id :- jethavanidhi8@gamil.com
3. Table of content
What is Utopia ?
What is Dystopia ?
Characteristics of Utopia Fiction
Characteristics of Dystopia Fiction
Varieties of Utopia
Varieties of Dystopia
4. What is Utopia
According to Cambridge dictionary:
a perfect society in
which people work well with each
other and are happy:
Try and imagine a perfect society, a
utopia, in which the government really
got everything right.
Humans, in the developed world at
least, are as close to utopia as they
are ever likely to
be, argues the professor.
5. What is Dystopia
Simply, a dystopia is defined as a bad
place, a place where no one would
want to live, a place in which one's
rights and freedoms would be gone, a
place where the environment would
be devastated. Dystopia is created
from the Greek prefix “dys” meaning
bad, harsh, or wrong and the Greek
root “topos” meaning place.
6. What is the Significance of Utopian
Fiction ?
Peaceful, benevolent government
Equality for citizens
Access to education, healthcare, employment, and so forth
Citizens are free to think independently
A safe, favorable environment
7. What is the significance Dystopia
Fiction ?
Dystopian novels that have a didactic message often explore themes like
anarchism, oppression, and mass poverty. Margaret Atwood, one of
literature’s most celebrated authors of dystopian fiction, thinks about it like
this: “If you’re interested in writing speculative fiction, one way to generate
a plot is to take an idea from current society and move it a little further
down the road. Even if humans are short-term thinkers, fiction can
anticipate and extrapolate into multiple versions of the future.”
8. Characteristics of Utopian Fiction
Utopian literature typically isolates elements of present day reality that
need improvement, and it then conjures worlds that feature that
improvement.
• Ecological utopia stories present worlds where climate and natural
resources no longer face the dire crises they do today.
• Feminist utopias offer worlds where women and men are fully equal.
• Technological utopias depict advancements in computing, robotics, and
transportation that are mere dreams in the present world.
9. Characteristics of Dystopian Fiction
Propaganda replaces education and is used to control the citizens of
society.
Information, independent thought, and freedom are restricted.
Citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance.
Citizens have a fear of the outside world.
Citizens live in a dehumanized state.
The natural world is banished and distrusted.
Citizens conform to uniform expectations. Individuality and dissent are
bad.
10. Verities of utopia
Ecological Utopia
Economic Utopia
Political Utopia
Religious Utopia
Science and Technology Utopia
12. What Is the Difference Between
Utopian Fiction and Dystopian Fiction?
According to James Patterson
Utopian fiction is set in a perfect world—an improved version of real life.
Dystopian fiction does the opposite.
A dystopian novel drops its main character into a world where everything
seems to have gone wrong at a macro level.
Much like utopian novels, dystopian novels can take place in the distant
future, the past, or an alternate present.
Some may feature altered versions of real world cities like New York and
London; others may be set in fully fictional locales.
13. How Utopia shaped the world ?
According to Tom Hodgkinson
More coined the word to describe an island community with an ideal mode
of government. First published in Latin in 1517, the book Utopia means “no
place” in Greek; some scholars have said that it may also be a pun on
“happy place”.
They live in perfect liberty, and have neither king nor lord. They observe no
laws – Amerigo Vespucci
The Diggers advocated a communistic philosophy: 'The earth ought to be
a common treasury to all’
The fundamental problem in creating perfect worlds: people don’t like
being told what to do.
Like their capitalist forebears in the 19th Century, Silicon Valley capitalists
talk about building ideal societies
14. Examples of Utopian and Dystopian
Fictions
Utopian
Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift
• A Modern Utopia by H. G. Wells
• Men Like Gods by H. G. Wells
• Childhood's End by Arthur C. Clarke
• Island by Aldous Huxley
• Always Coming Home by Ursula K.
Le Guin
• Walden Two by B. F. Skinner
• The Star Trek sci-fi television series
created by Gene Roddenberry
Dystopian
• Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
• The Giver by Lois Lowry
• 1984 by George Orwell
• The Hunger Games by Suzanne
Collins
• The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret
Atwood.
15. Citation
Green, Michael Bodhi. Studiobinder . 14 February 2021.
https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/what-is-dystopian-fiction-definition-characteristics/
Hodgkinson, Tom. "How utopia Shaped the World." BBC 6 October 2016.
https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20160920-how-utopia-shaped-the-world
Madhusudan, Dr. P.N. Utopian and Dystopian Literature: a comparative study . 2018.
More, Thomas, and Paul Turner. Utopia. Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1972
