Erewhon by Samuel Butler [1872]

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Contents Start Reading

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Based on his experiences in New Zealand, Samuel Butler wrote this account of a visit to a very peculiar utopian (dystopian, actually) society in the vein of Gullivers' Travels. This is not a blueprint for a better world but a means of satirizing the foibles of Victorian English society. Published anonymously in 1872, this book has influenced a number of successive authors, including G.B. Shaw, and a number of New Zealand utopian authors. Aldous Huxley cited Erewhon as a primary source of his own dystopia, Brave New World.

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Title Page
Preface to the First Edition
Preface To Second Edition
Preface To The Revised Edition
Chapter I: Waste Lands
Chapter II: In The Wool-shed
Chapter III: Up The River
Chapter IV: The Saddle
Chapter V: The River And The Range
Chapter VI: Into Erewhon
Chapter VII: First Impressions
Chapter VIII: In Prison
Chapter IX: To The Metropolis
Chapter X: Current Opinions
Chapter XI: Some Erewhonian Trials
Chapter XII: Malcontents
Chapter XIII: The Views Of The Erewhonians Concerning Death
Chapter XIV: Mahaina
Chapter XV: The Musical Banks
Chapter XVI: Arowhena
Chapter XVII: Ydgrun And The Ydgrunites
Chapter XVIII: Birth Formulae
Chapter XIX: The World Of The Unborn
Chapter XX: What They Mean By It
Chapter XXI: The Colleges Of Unreason
Chapter XXII: The Colleges Of Unreason—continued
Chapter XXIII: The Book Of The Machines
Chapter XXIV: The Machines—continued
Chapter XXV: The Machines—concluded
Chapter XXVI: The Views Of An Erewhonian Prophet Concerning The Rights of Animals
Chapter XXVII: The Views Of An Erewhonian Philosopher Concerning the Rights of Vegetables
Chapter XXVIII: Escape
Chapter XXIX: Conclusion