Thoughts about a book

I recently read a book called The Dispossessed by Ursula Le Guin. This story contrasts two societies with each other, an anarchist communist one and a capitalist authoritarian one. These societies were the ideal representations of both political ideologies, both at opposite ends of the “political compass”. The book displays both in equal light, illuminating both the faults and the strengths of each civilization. I was surprised at this, as I would’ve thought the author would give one preference over the other.

This was a central theme throughout the book: the ambiguity of which society was the utopia. The author did well of making me unsure of which society was better as I read the book. Both societies were introduced as utopian, but as I followed the main character, Shevek, as he explored and experienced them , fatal flaws were revealed underneath their shiny exteriors. For example, the capitalist society appeared initially as a rich and flashy paradise, but slowly the source of this wealth was revealed as the suffering of the lower classes in low paying jobs and long work hours. The anarchist society was presented as this poor but brotherly society where everyone shares resources and helps each other out. However, as the book progressed, readers began to see the instability of that society, and how hard it was to keep hierarchical systems, greed, and power structures from destroying the status quo.

Another theme I noticed and thought was interesting was the relativity of perfectness. The people in the capitalist society that thought of their society as utopia were the rich upper-class. The poor however thought of the anarchist society as utopia. I think this is an important thing to consider when we talk about perfect societies. We must be clear about what we mean by perfect, and to whom.

As I finished the book, I thought about the mutual imperfect of those two idealistic societies, and our own nowadays. I had to wonder if it was even possible to construct a perfect society? Could plans for one exist somewhere out there, waiting to be discovered? In the 1500s, Sir Thomas More wrote about this. In his book, he coined the term “utopia” as a name for this perfect society, using the Greek word for “nowhere”. It is fitting name for such a place.