Utopia

About this book

On a diplomatic mission to Flanders in 1515, Thomas More meets a well-travelled scholar, Raphael Hythloday, who has sailed with Amerigo Vespucci and lived for five years on a distant island called Utopia. In the first part they discuss the injustices of England, where thieves are hanged while sheep, as Hythloday puts it, devour men, as farmland is enclosed for wool; in the second he describes Utopia, where there is no private property, everyone works six hours a day, gold is used for chamber pots and chains, and religious tolerance is law.

Context and significance

Written in Latin and published in 1516, the book gave the world the word 'utopia', a Greek pun meaning both 'no place' and 'good place'. Thomas More (1478–1535) later became Lord Chancellor of England and was executed for refusing to accept Henry VIII as head of the Church. Compare Plato's Republic.

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