This virtual seminar, sponsored by Interactive Early Modern Literary Studies, will concentrate on Thomas More's Utopia as political literature, foremostly on the politics and poetics of the utopian form; it is integrated with a 'liveware' or 'classware' seminar (to use a phrase coined by the Augustinian scholar and pioneer in electronic teaching, James O'Donnell) run concurrently by Luc Borot (Centre d'Etudes et de Récherches sur la Renaissance Anglaise, Université Paul-Valery, Montpellier, France).
The seminar's purpose is to enable students and scholars the world over to read and discuss the text slowly -- an approach which is intended to discourage the practice of jumping to conclusions. As a group, we shall have to agree that we understand one passage, as it stands alone or in the context of the whole work, before we move on to the next. This may involve acknowledging the difficulties of a particular section or sections, or exploring a number of hypotheses. We shall refer to the Latin text and to available translations, the Latin text being the ultimate authority.
More's Utopia is the eponymous text of a genre that had begun long before, perhaps even before Plato. The astounding genesis of the Utopia attests to the vitality of projects which are both aesthetic and philosophical, and may lead us to reflect on the modes of expression of a political philosophy. What is the relationship between the text's political content and its literary form? Are there utopias or fictionalised presentations of theories in other philosophical fields? Questions such as these will inevitably appeal to the broadest range of academic disciplines.
A description of the larger context within which this virtual seminar will be offered can be found here.
The texts of Utopia, as prepared for us by Lou Burnard of the Oxford Text Archive, are available here.
The archive of the seminar's discussion list can be found here.
EMLS would like to thank the Oxford Text Archive for providing the text of the Utopia used in this seminar.
The seminar will begin on October 25, 1995.
Any inquiries should be directed to Luc Borot at lb@alor.univ-montp3.fr.
Applicants to the Utopia seminar must e-mail the following information to lb@alor.univ-montp3.fr:
