The Guest House is modeled on his own house, with its large dining room suggestive of an Icelandic communal hall (191). What house now stands on the site of his old dwelling? (191 W51) How has the building itself changed? Chapter 3: The Guest House and Breakfast Therein What attitude do the Nowherians express toward examples of medieval art? (These have been carefully preserved-Dick knows the history of buildings and coins, 189 W50) What now replaces the use of money? (exchange, 188 W 49-50) What comments are made about medieval and 19th century coins? What are features of the homes of the new society? (houses sympathetic with the life of dwellers, 187, W48 suburban gardens compare the "Garden City" movement) Whom does the narrator first encounter, and what are they wearing? (186 W47, clothes simple but beautiful) What familiar elements of his old world have disappeared? (186 W47) When the speaker awakes in the new society, what are some of the ways the world has changed? (water clearer, 184 W46, factories have disappeared, 186 W48) What symbolism is associated with seasonal change? What is the thematic significance of the dream motif? What are some of the pleasant sensations which the narrator describes in the opening chapters? (awakening, sleeping, coolness of air, moon, river, swimming) Chapter 2: A Morning Bath What associations would a dream-narrative have had for a Victorian audience? (among other things, it would have suggested a vision, a medieval dream-narrative, as in Piers Plowman, and the tradition of Romantic dream poems) What is the effect of the collapse of the original narrators into a first person dream? Hurry, discontent, stupidities, social awkwardnesses
All three of these are interested in the condition of the modern worker, and in the relationship of an empire to its colonies, though Morris is the only one to attack imperialism on moral and practical grounds. It was also written in response to Edward Bellamy's Looking Backward, the most popular of the period's many "utopian" projections, an American work which portrays a techno-centric, industrial and regimented society. News from Nowhere contains many echoes of Thomas More's Utopia. Among other things, News is his considered statement of his views on these questions.
This original context is reflected in News' reference to his socialist activities, and to socialists' heated discussion of the nature of an ideal society and how to obtain it. News from Nowhere was serialized in Commonweal, Morris's newspaper for the Socialist League. In the early 1880s he had become a socialist, and at the time of the writing of his utopia he was in his late 50s and was one of the leaders of the Socialist League. William Morris (1834-96) was a poet, designer, translator of the Icelandic sagas, writer of prose romances, founder of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, and a pioneer in fine book design.
0 kommentar(er)
