- Paperback: 320 pages
- Publisher: Oxford Paperbacks (Dec 13 2008)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0199537992
- ISBN-13: 978-0199537990
- Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 13.1 x 1.5 cm
- Shipping Weight: 222 g
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #121,765 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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Product Description
Book Description
Thomas More: Utopia/ Francis Bacon: New Atlantis/Henry Neville: The Isle of Pines With the publication of Utopia (1516), Thomas More introduced into the English language not only a new word, but a new way of thinking about the gulf between what ought to be and what is. His Utopia is at once a scathing analysis of the shortcomings of his own society, a realistic suggestion for an alternative mode of social organization, and a satire on unrealistic idealism. Enormously influential, itremains a challenging as well as a playful text. This edition reprints Ralph Robinson's 1556 translation from More's original Latin together with letters and illustrations that accompanied early editions of Utopia. Utopia was only one of many early modern treatments of other worlds. This edition also includes two other, hitherto less accessible, utopian narratives. New Atlantis (1627) offers a fictional illustration of Francis Bacon's visionary ideal of the role that science should play in the modern society. Henry Neville's The Isle of Pines (1668), a precursor of Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, engages with some of the sexual, racial, and colonialist anxieties of the end of the early modern period. Together these texts illustrate the diversity of the early modern utopian imagination, as well as the different purposes to which it could be put.
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Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Prose which still affects our thinking,
By A Customer
This review is from: Three Early Modern Utopias: Thomas More: Utopia / Francis Bacon: New Atlantis / Henry Neville: The Isle of Pines (Paperback)
Literature before James Joyce, before Jane Austen, before Daniel Defoe: No Ulysses, no Emma, no Robinson Crusoe - for modern readers it is hard to imagine a stock of English literature without the existence of these and other important writers and their 'novels'. What kind of literature could one refer to in a pre-novelistic age? As a matter of fact, there were authors, such as Sir Thomas More and Sir Francis Bacon, who wrote prose which, indeed, still affects our thinking. However, neither More nor Bacon used English, but chose Latin as their original means of expression. For what reasons? And none of these authors was in fact a free-lance writer - they were all occupied in public and political spheres. What made them actually write fictional works? How does their fiction relate to their cultural environment - or, what was regarded as 'fiction'? These texts cover a century of political, religious, scientific and literary debates and gave rise to a new understanding of knowledge, and introduced influential literary devices.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
4.3 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews) 14 of 15 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
This edition NOT recommended for certain teaching purposes,
By Twin Mom - Published on Amazon.com
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Three Early Modern Utopias: Thomas More: Utopia / Francis Bacon: New Atlantis / Henry Neville: The Isle of Pines (Paperback)
This edition of More's Utopia (and Bacon, and Neville), is a valuable volume in one respect: it makes available historic early translations/editions of these three texts. However, this aspect makes it less than desirable for one major intended audience of Oxford Classics: students in college courses. In particular, the 1557 edition of More's Utopia, while a fascinating read from a historical perspective (e.g. the use of "weal-public" alongside synonyms like commonweal, commonwealth, and republic), is simply too difficult and antiquated for most college students to understand and appreciate what is going on in this important text. I'm a college instructor and I ordered this volume because it seemed to offer a good value for all three works. But my students found it MUCH too hard to understand (and I have to admit, the Utopia text was even slow going for me), so I had to post an online version in more contemporary English for them to read, and the week's discussion was hijacked by this problem of the text. Bottom line, if you are looking for a course text that will engage your students, keep shopping, because this edition will only frustrate them (and you, when you have to find another text of Utopia for them to read).
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting tales, particulary the lesser-known "Isle of Pines",
By Fry Boy - Published on Amazon.com
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This review is from: Three Early Modern Utopias: Thomas More: Utopia / Francis Bacon: New Atlantis / Henry Neville: The Isle of Pines (Paperback)
As usual, Oxford does a good job with translations, introductions and notes.More's "Utopia" is the longest and best of the three works presented in this book, at least as far as fleshing out the details of how a utopian civilization would really look, particularly when situated among other civilizations. But, since most people are familiar with it to some degree, I'll discuss the other two writings in more detail. Bacon's "New Atlantis" is the least satisfying of the three utopian civilizations. First, it isn't complete, barely beginning before it ends. Second, it seems to be more about scientific specialization (i.e. how the New Atlantic culture has made great strides in various fields of science [e.g. agriculture, astronomy]) than about utopian society per se. It is interesting how Bacon relates these islanders, far from Europe, to the famed ancient Atlantean society. Neville's "Isle of Pines" is an interesting tale of shipwreck and discovery. A ship sinks near the coast of a faraway island, killing everyone except a man with the last name "Pine" and a few women, one of whom is black. What follows is a fascinating story of old/new-world racism and debauchery. Basically, the Pine fellow starts bedding ALL the women (two of whom, if I recall, are sisters) because, you know, they're not getting rescued any time soon and they've got to keep civilization going. Eventually, they all dispense with the wearing of clothes. Then ALL the women get pregnant and turn into baby factories and everyone breeds like rabbits until there are hundreds of people within one or two generations. The interesting tack that Neville takes is that Pine only sleeps with the black woman at night, she "craftily" sneaking into his bed. In addition, her progeny happen to be the bad apples of the island, which is discussed from the perspective of some visiting sailors many years after the shipwreck. Fascinating view into the European mind from several centuries back. 2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Good collection,
By M "CultOfStrawberry" - Published on Amazon.com
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This review is from: Three Early Modern Utopias: Thomas More: Utopia / Francis Bacon: New Atlantis / Henry Neville: The Isle of Pines (Paperback)
I have enjoyed Oxford World Classics for a long time because of the notes, biographies, and other content that is added to the book to supplement the stories themselves. This is a decent collection of three stories, with all the necessary notes and such. If you're curious about Utopia, buy this book and you'll get two other visions of Utopia as well, making for a good overall reading experience (once you get past the old language, which is rather clunky at times, but that is how it was written) and you'll learn a few things too.
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