Thomas More's Utopia

Misha Glenny (0:00)

This is one of more than a thousand episodes that you can find in the In Our Time Archive. A reading list for this edition can be found in the episode description wherever you're listening. I hope you enjoy the program.

Hello.

In 1516, a small book was published with a curious new word as its title, Utopia.

In it, the book's author, the lawyer and politician Thomas More, described a seemingly perfect but entirely fictional island. More's notoriously ambiguous text has been read as a blueprint for an ideal society, a scathing satire, and a timeless warning. Less than 20 years after he wrote the book, Thomas More was executed for refusing to accept King Henry VIII as the supreme head of the English Church. But in the 500 years since it was first published, Utopia's exploration of how and why we might imagine alternative worlds has been hugely influential and challenging. Well, with me to discuss Thomas More's Utopia, Laura Ashe, Professor of English Literature at Worcester College, University of Oxford, Cathy Shrank, Professor of Tudor and Renaissance Literature at the University of Sheffield, and Joanne Paul, Honorary Associate Professor of Intellectual History at the University of Sussex. Welcome to you all, but it's to Joanne who I want to come to first. Joanne, can you tell us what do we need to know about Thomas More the man and how he came to write Utopia?

Joanne Paul (1:41)

One of the things that's important to keep in mind about the writing of Utopia is that Thomas More is nearly 40 when he writes it. He's already lived quite a bit of his life.

In particular, he's devoted a lot of time and attention to his scholarship. I think we'll probably talk more about his connections to the European humanist movement and in particular, its leader Erasmus.

He's also devoted quite a bit of time to public service. He's involved in the city of London, is under sheriff there. He's also an MP for Westminster. Finally, he has a family. And I think we'll see when we talk about the different parts of Utopia, how all of these things come into play to build it. But most importantly, when he writes Utopia, he's on a diplomatic mission for the king. He's in the Low Countries. And he actually begins the book by setting it precisely in that circumstance.

Misha Glenny (2:40)

What was that diplomatic mission about?

Joanne Paul (2:43)

Trade, essentially, without going into all the ins and outs of the wool trade and the cloth industry. They were renegotiating a treaty with the Holy Roman Empire through which a lot of it came through the Low Countries, Bruges and Antwerp.

Misha Glenny (2:58)

And those discussions came to a sort of abrupt end. And he found himself with time on his hands, is that right?

Joanne Paul (3:05)

Thomas More found himself to be bored, which didn't happen much for him. He has four children, several careers. He was bored and nothing else to do. And so he ended up going down to Antwerp and meeting a fellow humanist there. And out of that came Utopia.

Misha Glenny (3:20)

Now you mentioned Erasmus as the leader of the humanist movement.

What's his relationship to More and to the text? And who was Erasmus?

Joanne Paul (3:30)

Erasmus was, as I said, this leading figure of this new humanist movement. By that we mean a curriculum for learning that focused really on the recovery of ancient Greek and Roman texts. And particularly a focus on how to use those texts and the lessons they contained for the public good. And again, we'll see some of that coming through in Utopia. More and Erasmus had met in 1499 At the same time, they had met the young Prince Henry, who would become Henry VIII. And they actually didn't start off on the best feet with each other.

Erasmus was embarrassed that he didn't have something to offer the prince. More did. And Erasmus said— You mean as a present? As a present, yes, exactly. You were expected to show up with a piece of writing that praised the prince. And Erasmus was not briefed on this.

More was. And so Erasmus, out of his embarrassment, said that at dinner, he engaged his Spartan habit of sparring until I drew blood on Thomas More. So they got into some sort of intellectual debate. But very soon after, they became friends, and they were exchanging letters. And Erasmus stayed at More's house at various points.

Misha Glenny (4:45)

So Cathy Shrank, how did that humanist context influence the book? What was the essence of humanism that More was channelling into Utopia?

Cathy Shrank (4:57)

Utopia is absolutely steeped in humanism, both in terms of its style and its content. As Joanne said, that humanism is a movement that goes back to the classics and reapplies the learning that might be drawn from that to contemporary affairs.