L’Utopie – un genre amphibie
Utopia – An Amphibious Genre

Summary/Abstract: Utopia is a multifold genre that was often given distinct and contradictory definitions. This paper tries to systematize the main concepts created by theoreticians of the genre in order to describe the different typologies engendered by Thomas More’s seminal text. It arranges them in a deductive progression, from the largest and all-encompassing to the smaller and very precise ones. It presents several dialectical oppositions: practical/ theoretical utopias, utopian mood/ utopian genre, utopianism/ utopia, heterotopia/ utopia, political treatise/ narrative utopia, etc. It also distinguishes between utopia and neighboring genres like myth, fairy tale, travel narrative, extraordinary voyage, novel and romance, robinsonade, and science fiction. The scope of this theoretical and historical survey is to contribute a better focused concept of utopia.

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