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| Looking Backward | 
 enlarge | Author: Edward Bellamy
Publisher: Applewood Books(MA)
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
Buy New: $7.22
You Save: $7.73 (52%)
New (18) Used (9) Collectible (1) from $6.98
Avg. Customer Rating:  44 reviews
Sales Rank: 209149
Media: Paperback
Edition: 0
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 220
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.4 x 0.6
ISBN: 155709506X
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9781557095060
ASIN: 155709506X
Publication Date: September 1, 2000
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: brand new , old stock, might have a tiny bit of cover wear from being shelved
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Product Description
Set in Boston on December 26, 2000, but written before the turn of the nineteenth century, this classic Utopian novel is more significant and relevant than ever with its reappearance this millennium. Addressing moral and material concerns of late nineteenth century industrial America through romantic narrative, Bellamy suggests a fictionalized society in which war, poverty, and malice do not exist.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 39 more reviews...
 (relatively) Little Known Sci-Fi Utopia October 26, 2008
Bellamy presents a simple, almost Poe-like magic realism; a man moves forward in time through the simple expedient of a trance. He is shocked by the utopia he encounters, and spends time acclimating to the new moral climate. His Utopian society is economically and socially egalitarian, without being totalitarian - imagine a combination of libertarianism and communism mixed and done properly. Of course, the 20th century has lead this book to seem, well, unreasonable; we gain few insights into society. However, as an early work in science fiction or magic realism, this work stands out; the man-out-of-his-own-time has been done since, well imitated and improved, but this is one of the foundations. A must for sci-fi and magic realism readers.
 More an Economic Manifesto Than Great Fiction October 25, 2008
** spoiler alert ** This book reads more like an economic manifesto than a work of fiction. A man from the late 1800s falls asleep and wakes up to find that he was in such a deep trance that it's now the year 2000. Nearly the entire book is a discourse on what has changed over the course of the century. Many of the changes really have happened, but most have not. Even though retirement at age 45 would be nice, the overall government-run utopia Bellamy suggests will never be possible unless human nature changes. I w...more This book reads more like an economic manifesto than a work of fiction. A man from the late 1800s falls asleep and wakes up to find that he was in such a deep trance that it's now the year 2000. Nearly the entire book is a discourse on what has changed over the course of the century. Many of the changes really have happened, but most have not. Even though retirement at age 45 would be nice, the overall government-run utopia Bellamy suggests will never be possible unless human nature changes. I would have enjoyed this book more if there was an actual storyline somewhere other than at the very beginning and very end of the book.
Changes That Have Happened:
*artificial lighting
*absence of chimneys and smoke for heating
*"credit cards"
*programs for listening to music live ... possibly internet since it's by telephone connection
*doctors may only practice if they've passed medical school
*radio alarm clock
*women in the work place
*church by phone connection (internet?)
Changes That Haven't Happened:
*the rise of monopolies choked out small businesses finally and finally gave rise to one company that owned everything (without any bloody revolution because the people all wanted it)
*governments aren't allowed to have enough power to use for maleficent causes
*Harder jobs have fewer hours and easier jobs have more hours to make it so that there is someone who wants to do every job
*every person is a common laborer during the first 3 years of their work service
*there is no buying nor selling
*there are no banks
*everyone has the same salary
*"the nation guarantees the nurture, education, and comfortable maintenance of every citizen from the cradle to the grave"
*free immigration because one country doesn't have to feed and clothe the person anymore and the other gets a free worker
*waterproof enclosed corridor appears during rainstorms for going out without an umbrella
*retirement at age 45
*free education up to age 21 (about grade 18)
not worth your time January 10, 2008
The book is (at best) a third rate utopian hack job, that maybe has some interest for those who have a special interest in utopian lit.
Good, but a bit boring February 1, 2007
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I enjoyed reading "Looking Backward." It speaks much about the problems facing America near the turn of the century; the problems that affected almost everyone in America every day. The problems of greedy monopolists is the most evident, but also others. The book is not as much as a story as it is the author laying out his groundwork for a perfect society with a story sort of, but not really, built around it. There is sort of a romace, but almost the entire book is characters telling the protagonist what the future is like. I do find it funny though. Back in the 19th century, authors GREATLY underestimated the technological progress of mankind. Just decades later, it was the opposite- and authors were greatly overestimating it.
The world through rose-colored glasses January 20, 2007
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
Julian West is put to sleep by a mesmerizer (a quack) in 1887 and wakes up again in the year 2000. He encounters a Dr. Leete who explains to him in great detail how the world has changed - mainly how it has been transformed into a magnificent socialistic Utopia where everyone is the same. There is no war, no competition, and everyone lives in peace and harmony. Bellamy was a true believer in Marx and his theories and he wrote this book as a pleasing presentation of Socialism and, to him, its saving graces. When the government controlled everything and everyone, he believed everyone would be treated the same and there would be no class/economic differences and struggles. It's kind of laughable, in a way, because it depicts people in a way that seems contrary to human behavior. Bellamy also didn't have the benefit of the 20th century and the horrors inflicted by Stalin, Mao and others in the name of Marx to temper his overly optimistic views. It's a classic, though, of Utopian literature; one might even imagine it the last of its kind, but Utopia will always beckon a fevered imagination that sees great unhappiness in the world.
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