Practical Utopian

PeterL · Sep 26, 2009

I heard about Ralph Nader's novel (Only the Super-Rich can Save Us)this morning. He calls it a practical utopian novel, claiming that it doesn't fit any of the classifications that already exist. I was wondering if anyone has an opinion on whether that term might be worthwhile. Personally, I think that is a great name for a sub-genre, and it makes more sense than many of the terms that already exist.

Xelebes · Sep 26, 2009

It may be a good name, but I'm not too sure if it meas anything. I will have to read the book to see if there is any meat to the name.

PeterL · Sep 26, 2009

That's my feeling also. From the radio interview, I got the impression that Ralph wrote a really funny book by mistake, but I would want to read it before I made a strong judgment.
http://www.tcdailyplanet.net/events/ralph-nader-only-super-rich-can-save-us
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/2009/09/28/090928ta_talk_khatchadourian

Dawnstorm · Sep 28, 2009

As an exercise, I googled the term "practical utopia" on googlescholar. I found that most of the hits weren't literary, but political, often referring to city planning.

I immediately thought of Sao Paulo's "Clean City Law" in 2007, that outlawed all public advertisments:

Recent assessment

Recent project

Interview with a Sao Paulo journalist (Note the site's name: "adbusters.org" - which suggest utopian alignment.)

As a literary name for a "what if?" all this can do is be inspirational, and since Nader's title suggest that "only the super-rich can save us", but the target readership is probably not super-rich, I question the practical value. It's arm waving and distracting at best: you aren't super-rich, you can't do anything, sit back and wait for your betters to do things for you. I'm not sure that's very practical in its effect.

So I'm wondering what we're going on here. Utopia's can be satirical (More's Utopia) or inspirational (Francis Bacon's New Atlantis), and then they'll have whatever effect they have. But Nadar's piece of wouldn't-it-be-nice dreaming (I didn't read it, mind you), sounds like it's neither. What are we supposed to do?

What are the formal constraints of a literary term, "practical utopia"? This-world-ness? Minimal world-modification? Optimism/Naivite? I just can't tell.

PeterL · Sep 28, 2009

Dawnstorm said:
As an exercise, I googled the term "practical utopia" on googlescholar. I found that most of the hits weren't literary, but political, often referring to city planning.

I immediately thought of Sao Paulo's "Clean City Law" in 2007, that outlawed all public advertisments:

I also did that search, and the results were interesting but slanted.

As a literary name for a "what if?" all this can do is be inspirational, and since Nader's title suggest that "only the super-rich can save us", but the target readership is probably not super-rich, I question the practical value. It's arm waving and distracting at best: you aren't super-rich, you can't do anything, sit back and wait for your betters to do things for you. I'm not sure that's very practical in its effect.

So I'm wondering what we're going on here. Utopia's can be satirical (More's Utopia) or inspirational (Francis Bacon's New Atlantis), and then they'll have whatever effect they have. But Nadar's piece of wouldn't-it-be-nice dreaming (I didn't read it, mind you), sounds like it's neither. What are we supposed to do?

What are the formal constraints of a literary term, "practical utopia"? This-world-ness? Minimal world-modification? Optimism/Naivite? I just can't tell.

I'm thinking that Nader is trying to create a positive reaction to his book by using positive terms. From what I know of the book (Ihaven't read it, but I may) it probably is very funny. Nader never has been the sort to take a joke well, but he may learn that art.

I do think that the term is useful in literature, but there has to be a bit of humor.

Kitty Pryde · Sep 28, 2009

I believe it's more of the same old "I wrote a book which is good and serious and thusly it cannot possibly be science fiction/fantasy" a la Margaret Atwood, Audrey Niffeneger, et al. He's gone one step further and picked out a special name.

From the io9 review (bolding mine):

Nade...has been featured as a character in other people's novels, including Greg Bear's Eon, which the New Yorker says

portrays Nader as "a saintly figure, a hero in a wasteland," whose followers win landslide elections in North America and Western Europe (in 2011) and bring down the Soviet Union (in 2012). "You see, that's science-fiction utopia," Nader said. "Nobody can give that any credibility."

Meanwhile, his book, with not much more credibility-giving, IMO, is about:

17 billionaires...who name themselves "Meliorists," believers that people can make the world better. They persuade the elusive Warren Beatty to run against Arnold Schwarzenegger for California governor. They conspire to force Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to allow its workers to unionize. They push for universal health care. They start a new political party, dedicated to publicly financed elections. They are so quick, and clever, their foes can't catch up.

PeterL · Sep 28, 2009

Kitty Pryde said:
I believe it's more of the same old "I wrote a book which is good and serious and thusly it cannot possibly be science fiction/fantasy" a la Margaret Atwood, Audrey Niffeneger, et al. He's gone one step further and picked out a special name.

From the io9 review (bolding mine):

portrays Nader as "a saintly figure, a hero in a wasteland," whose followers win landslide elections in North America and Western Europe (in 2011) and bring down the Soviet Union (in 2012). "You see, that's science-fiction utopia," Nader said. "Nobody can give that any credibility."

But he does have a point, and old Science Fiction Utopian novels have been moved away from the SF part. No one considers de Bergerac's Autre Mondes as SF any more, but it was written as science fiction, and it is Utopian.

Kitty Pryde · Sep 28, 2009

PeterL said:
But he does have a point, and old Science Fiction Utopian novels have been moved away from the SF part. No one considers de Bergerac's Autre Mondes as SF any more, but it was written as science fiction, and it is Utopian.

If you want to go back in time that far, it's hard to pin down genre on many novels. They just don't fit modern categories. My point is, Nader is saying "Oh, that over there, that sci-fi stuff, it's not realistic and not taken seriously. My book, on the other hand, is realistic and you should take it seriously and thus we must never call it sci-fi." But how is his utopia any more 'practical' and less sciencefictional than a given near-future utopia SF novel? How is the concept of the super-rich banding together to save the rest of us not firmly in the realm of SF?

Also, it's 700 pages long, therefore it must be SF or fantasy

PeterL · Sep 28, 2009

Kitty Pryde said:
If you want to go back in time that far, it's hard to pin down genre on many novels. They just don't fit modern categories. My point is, Nader is saying "Oh, that over there, that sci-fi stuff, it's not realistic and not taken seriously. My book, on the other hand, is realistic and you should take it seriously and thus we must never call it sci-fi." But how is his utopia any more 'practical' and less sciencefictional than a given near-future utopia SF novel? How is the concept of the super-rich banding together to save the rest of us not firmly in the realm of SF?

Also, it's 700 pages long, therefore it must be SF or fantasy

I understand what you mean, especially about the length, but many SF novels were written as socio-political commentary, but they wer published as SF, because there was no classification for political commentary that was set in the future or on another planet.

Nader is one of the most foolish people who has been on the political scene, but I want to take a look at his book. I suspect that he included too many characters, but he may have made it work.

JeremiahJohnson · Feb 2, 2010

A great deal of thought has been spent by members of the modern anarchist community concerning coming to a practical, workable utopia. From what I understand (never paid enough attention to the guy to know for sure), Nader's sort of ultra-left, not much of an anarchist at all.

I've messed around a bit with the concept. In Eschillion Key,
a novel I published on my website for free, there are at least two false utopias and Eschillion (my word for real utopia) is never directly stated - but the concept is exploited throughout the rest of my website, in various ways.

Island was Aldous Huxley's experiment with practical Utopia.

http://zeitgeistmovie.com/ - The end of the second Zeitgeist film offers some suggestions toward a more utopian society.

http://www.bfi.org/taxonomy/term/170/all - Fuller's World Game can be thought of as intended to trigger a more Utopian way of living.

shaldna · Feb 17, 2010

Sometimes I feel that authors are so snobby/desperate to be considered original that they don't think their work will fit into any of those inferior categories.

Sometimes it's nothing more than an attempt to make a book/concept/writer seem more interesting.

PeterL · Feb 17, 2010

shaldna said:
Sometimes it's nothing more than an attempt to make a book/concept/writer seem more interesting.

That's worthy.

shaldna · Mar 10, 2010

PeterL said:
That's worthy.

Of what?

PeterL · Mar 10, 2010

shaldna said:
Of what?

Of a mind

shaldna · Mar 11, 2010

PeterL said:
Of a mind

If you say so.

Practical Utopian

PeterL

Xelebes

Delerium ex Ennui

PeterL

Dawnstorm

punny user title, here

PeterL

Kitty Pryde

i luv you giant bear statue

PeterL

Kitty Pryde

i luv you giant bear statue

PeterL

JeremiahJohnson

shaldna

The cake is a lie. But still cake.

PeterL

shaldna

The cake is a lie. But still cake.

PeterL

shaldna

The cake is a lie. But still cake.