Future Visions of America in Looking Backward by Edward...

Published in 1888 Looking Backward depicts a future vision of America. Utopian Boston of the year 2000 is designed in a constructive method that excludes capitalism. Through the medium of romantic novel, Bellamy seeks to impose the idea of socialism into the nineteenth-century American society. Written at a period when economic growth went off the rails triggering the rise in unequal distribution of wealth, Looking Backward attempts to propose a reform in social and economic systems. From the eyes of the narrator, the novel presents a spectrum of changes and possibilities for the 19th century audience. Plagued by the social chaos of the Gilded Age, Julian West falls asleep with difficulty in 1887 to wake up to the Boston of year 2000, and finds out that all the evils bothering him in the 19th century have been cast aside. As the last sparkles of the Civil War cooled down, a period of transformation took over U.S. and the endeavour to restore post Civil War economy initiated. The Gilded Age, as Mark Twain referred, was a time identified with economic boom and social change. During those years, U.S. experienced the transition from agricultural to urban together with industrialisation, scientific innovations and an economic boom. This modernisation evolvement however, was followed by negative outcomes: as labour demand amplified the need for immigration broke out and poverty became a remarkable issue. What is more, the growth of middle class and its insatiable appetiteShow MoreRelatedEssay on Visions of Utopia in Bellamys Looking Backward749 Words   |  3 PagesVisions of Utopia in Looking Backward  Ã‚   Edward Bellamy addressed many of the topics crucial to the development of a civilization in his book, Looking Backward. In the story he addresses several different features of years past utopias. 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