University of Bucharest Review. Literary and Cultural Studies Series (Feb 2022)
THE RATIONALIST CRITIQUE OF UTOPIAN THINKING: ISLAND OF FOOLS AND OTHER ANTI-UTOPIAN CLASSICS
Abstract
During 17th-18th centuries, the pressure exercised by combined critiques due to religious ideology and later on by rationalist mentality rendered utopias suspect to the eyes of many authors. Christian counter-utopists, ranging from Joseph Hall to Jonathan Swift, accepted and adopted the dogmas related to the Lost Earthly Paradise and Man’s Cursed City, transforming the utopian space into hell on earth, into monstrous kingdoms that would rival Dante’s circles. In turn, humanist counter-utopists, skeptical regarding man’s capacity of establishing a perfect society, found other means of expressing their incredulity as well as their sarcasms. They imagined madmen islands and kingdoms of fouls, demonstrating, by reductio ab absurdum, that the application of the ideals of reason to social programs would only led to nightmarish societies.
