News from Nowhere: The Dream of a More Beautiful Life

Imagine waking up one morning and finding a very different world. The birds are chirping, the sun is shining, the sky is blue. The streets are sparkling clean, the water of the city river is crystal clear. People look their best, they’re in a good mood and greet you in a friendly manner. Riding public transportation is for free and you can go into a store and choose what your heart desires without paying for it. You can freely choose when, what and how much you want to work. You like to work with your hands, so one day you choose to bake bread and because you appreciate good food and the smell of the freshly baked bread when it comes out of the oven – it’s all wonderful! You’re happy and so is your family. The next day you help out in the bicycle repair shop around the corner. You like to tinker, have a steady hand and a good understanding of mechanics. You patch tire hoses, tighten brakes and change the light bulbs in bicycle lights. At the end of the day, you've helped a lot of people who can now ride their bikes again. You’re happy and at the end of the day, you go to bed satisfied. 

Doesn't sound bad, does it? A world that is ecologically sustainable, where you don't have to worry about money or your job and only work when you feel like it. Such a world is imagined by William Morris in his book News from Nowhere (1890). The English author, letterpress printer and textile designer imagines here a stark counter-scenario to his own time. For what he observes in the large cities of England in the 19th century doesn’t please him at all. The cities are suffocating under smog, the houses are blackened with soot, and the chimneys of the factories dominate the cityscape. Many workers are destitute, starving and living in dangerous unsanitary conditions.

For him, the problem lies with capitalism. This social order allows certain parts of the population to live in misery, requires huge factories that pollute the environment and produces low-quality products en masse. This is debatable, but Morris is a convinced socialist, and his book is neither a pro or con discussion about the capitalist mode of production, but rather a socialist utopia. So what does this utopia look like?

In some respects, Morris's thinking was exceedingly progressive. News of Nowhere is sometimes treated as the first "eco-topia," that is, a utopia that also or primarily imagines an ecologically better world. He is particularly interesting as a pioneer of modern urban development. For he is not fundamentally against urban spaces, just as he is not fundamentally against mechanical or technological progress. He merely puts his point across that the developments of the 19th century - urban sprawl, overpopulation in cities, and the displacement of nature from cities - should be corrected. He supports combining the best of the city and the countryside. Morris advocated that the city should become part of the countryside and the countryside part of the city. He described cities with sufficient green spaces, clean air, water and rural areas that are well connected in terms of infrastructure and just as technologically advanced as the cities. Nothing else has been attempted in "urban development" but today, trees have recently started to grow on the roofs of apartment buildings in inner cities and the expansion of the travel network in rural areas is progressing - well, it's all been planned, after all...

In other aspects however, the socialist utopia is decidedly anti-progressive. The world into which the protagonist William Guest finds himself transported overnight resembles more a pastoral idyll with medieval touches than any futuristic scenario - despite the fact that we have actually time-travelled ahead to the year 2102. In the 22nd century, there are no airplanes, no internet and certainly no AI robots. For despite all the justified criticism of capitalism, it has nevertheless managed one thing and that is many goods have become increasingly cheaper over time and material prosperity has risen continuously in many parts of the world. In the 1920‘s, only a few wealthy people could afford a car, just a couple decades later almost everyone in the country could. That kind of progress doesn't exist here, instead there is still a lot of artisanal and manual work going on in Nowhere. Guest helps with the hay harvest, he strolls through the weekly market offering regional agricultural products, and he admires the woodcarvers artistic offerings of model houses. 

This is largely due to Morris's own deep affection for the Middle Ages, which he discovered for himself during his studies. Whether it was Gothic architecture, stained glass windows, wrought ironwork or manuscripts decorated with ornate monograms, Morris was fascinated by all these forms of craftsmanship. Above all, he admired the way the useful and the aesthetically beautiful came together and, making objects that were both functional and attractive became the guiding principle of his life. In 1861, he founded Morris & Company, a decorative arts firm that produced furniture, metalwork, rugs, wallpaper, stained glass, and murals. In 1891, he founded the Kelmscott Press, a private printing company that produced limited editions of books which were considerably expensive and stylistically modeled on medieval illustrated manuscripts. With his determination to elevate craft to an art, or rather to abolish the separation between craft and artwork, Morris became an important precursor of the Bauhaus. With his demand for, and creation of a beautifully crafted book, he had a lasting influence on book culture and was largely responsible for the emergence of the artistic book movement in England.

This aesthetic vision is probably the most appealing aspect of Morris's novel. After all, it's hard to disagree with the desire for a society to produce only items that are of high quality, made with care, quite useful and beautiful to boot. No more cheap junk, no more mass-produced goods that are made in a flash and break just as quickly. (By the way, brands like manufactum have long understood this desire and turned this idea into a profitable business model). However, the vision not only refers to the objects that are produced, but also - and this is particularly important, to the quality of the work. 

The question of work is always a sticking point in every socialist theory. Critics point out that  nobody would go to work if they didn't have to! But, there are different answers to this. The American Edgar Bellamy, who also published a successful socialist utopia shortly before Morris, sees work as a necessary evil and the solution is reducing its quantity as much as possible. Not so for Morris whose philosophy is more optimistic. For him, work is not just something we have to do to live, but in fact a gift. Because, Morris declares work can be fun, and people can find joy in their work - if they keep a few things in mind. One should choose work that matches their skills and talents. One should reduce the number of working hours to a comfortable level. As a result, one could definitely feel contentment, both during the work day and in the finished product. This philosophy of work is convincing and an ideal worth striving for. (Footnote: Morris also admits that some work will never be beautiful or enjoyable. Ideally, these monotonous, physically taxing, or otherwise reluctant tasks such as street sweeping or toilet cleaning should be taken over by machines to the greatest extent possible).

In this often successful blueprint of a brave new world, there are however, also less beautiful places. From today's perspective for example, the fact that all the inhabitants of this Nowhere look decidedly good and healthy seems a bit un-nerving. On the one hand, it is of course true that good physical health and overall appearance of a person strongly depends on his living conditions. The emaciated, malnourished, and coal-dust covered workers Morris may have had in mind when writing his book were probably not a pleasant sight. Beyond that however, the text suggests that a person's moral character is reflected in their physical features. This idea was popularized in the 18th century by the publication Physiognomischen Fragmente, zur Beförderung der Menschenkenntniß und Menschenliebe (Physiognomic Fragments, for the Promotion of Knowledge of Man and Love of Man) by the Swiss Johann Caspar Lavatar, and was cruelly misused in the 20th century to support the racial theory of the National Socialists. 

The author seems to have had a real lapse in judgement in this respect when he allows his character to tell the following story without any recognizable irony or critical discipline: "In former times, many are said to have been afflicted with a hereditary evil called 'laziness', because they were directly descended from people who, in the evil old days had been accustomed to make others work for them - from those people who were either slaveholders or employers mentioned in the history books. Now, these lazy people, at the beginning of our epoch, filled all their time with serving others in shops, because they had no skills for other pursuits. And I even believe that for a while they were actually forced to do some kind of work, because otherwise they and their women would become too ugly and in turn have ugly children, and their neighbors could no longer stand by and watch. Fortunately, those days are over." One should counter: Fortunately, those days are gone when you can claim such an absurd connection between a person's looks and his or her inner strength or character. That today, such a theory is no longer taken seriously by a person with any degree of intelligence. Hopefully! 

While some parts of this tranquil medieval setting are ideologically ugly, others remain entirely empty. For example, News of Nowhere fails to explain comprehensively or exactly how society should function economically and politically. While there is a lengthy section in the middle of the book in which William Guest uses a list of questions typical of utopias to interview an inhabitant of this novel country about its ways, the answers are often incomplete. Which is a pity, because the questions are relevant and exciting! How for instance does a society function without money? Do famines or shortages of goods really never occur? Aren't there disputes when there is suddenly much less for everyone but, one person thinks he deserves more than the other? 

In Morris's utopia, people are terribly reasonable, modest and oriented toward the common good, sometimes to an almost ridiculous extent. That's unrealistic, because" our inner voice protests loudly. To which another replies: Exactly, because it is also a utopia - a beautiful, good, ideal place and at the same time a non-place. Somewhere that can only be beautiful and good because it doesn't exist. For News of Nowhere, Morris deliberately chooses the format of a romance rather than a political manifesto, treatise, or essay. He had already expressed his political thoughts in all available media, he founded the Socialist League, published his theories in Commonweal, the League's magazine and given numerous lectures. But Morris was convinced of one thing, it's not enough to use your mind to understand what a better world might look like - you have to feel it. And that's exactly what this book aims to convey, The feeling of life in a more beautiful world.