Spensonia is a fictional

Utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book '' Utopia'', describing a fictional island socie ...

n country created by the English author and political reformer

Thomas Spence Thomas Spence ( 17508 September 1814) was an English RadicalProperty in Land Every One's Rightin 1775. It was re-issued as ''The Real Rights of Man'' in later editions. It was also reissued by, amongst others, Henry Hyndman under the title o ...

. Spence laid out his ideas about Spensonia in a series of literary works published in the late 18th century: * ''A Supplement to the History of Robinson Crusoe'' (1782) * ''A Marine Republic, or A Description of Spensonia'' (1794) * ''The Constitution of a Perfect Commonwealth'' (1798) * ''The Constitution of Spensonia: A Country in Fairyland Situated Between Utopia and Oceana'' (1801) * ''The Receipt to Make a Millenium or Happy World'' (1805). Spence issued these works in several editions, creating a complex bibliography. Since he also developed and advocated his own scheme of language reform, he released his Spensonian works in both standard spelling texts and in his own Spensonian alphabet. Spence's utopian writings are significant in that he was the first to apply Enlightenment ideas about democracy and majority rule to the genre, and also the first to attempt a utopian response to the

Industrial Revolution The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...

. Spence's utopian works "were directed explicitly at the major institutions, economic and political, of the time. In so doing he provided the model of most future utopias."

Plot

Spence united these utopian writings with a frame story about shipwrecked English mariners. When a ship carrying English merchant brothers is stranded on a remote island, the brothers decide to take the arrangement they had aboard ship, the "Marine Constitution" given to them by their father, and apply it to their life on land; and so they create a commonwealth of collective ownership. The land of the island is the property of the collective, and individuals rent it for their own uses. They organize their own democratic government to manage their new social system.

Lewis Mumford Lewis Mumford (October 19, 1895 – January 26, 1990) was an American historian, sociologist, philosopher of technology, and literary critic. Particularly noted for his study of cities and urban architecture, he had a broad career as a w ...

, ''The Story of Utopias'', New York, Boni and Liveright, 1922; Forgotten Books, 2008; pp. 81-3. Their society thrives and flourishes. Men and women are equal. Spensonia maintains cordial relations with other republics, and extends political asylum to refugees from tyranny. There is an official religion, a sort of vague

deism Deism ( or ; derived from the Latin '' deus'', meaning "god") is the philosophical position and rationalistic theology that generally rejects revelation as a source of divine knowledge, and asserts that empirical reason and observation ...

, though all other religions are tolerated. News of the island of Spensonia is brought back to England by a figure named Captain Swallow.

References

{{reflist Utopian fiction Fictional countries Fictional island countries