Utopia and Anti-Utopia: William Morris and George Orwell

Peter Stansky contrasts two socialist visions for the world, one optimistic and one pessimistic.

George Orwell

It seems certain that as long as the world is an imperfect place to live in, we shall have Utopians, envisioning a world in the future in which all imperfections have been cleansed away. And it is equally certain also that, as long as the world is imperfect, we shall also have anti-Utopians, envisioning a world of the future in which the imperfections of the present have dramatically worsened and reached a kind of appalling fulfilment.

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