L’utopie de Thomas More à Rabelais : sources antiques et réécritures

• Published in: Kentron Vol. 24; no. 24; pp. 123 - 148
• Main Author: Lacore-Martin, Emmanuelle
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English; French
• Published: Presses universitaires de Caen 01.12.2008
• Subjects: Aristotle; Lucian; More; Plato; Rabelais; utopia
• ISSN: 0765-0590; 2264-1459
• DOI: 10.4000/kentron.1644

Amongst the ancient philosophers who examined the question of the best political community, Plato and Aristotle appear as the essential sources of More’s Utopia, published in 1516. The form of the philosophical dialogue in Book I or that of the political philosophy treatise in Book II implicitly shape this most original text that represents the first example of a new literary genre. But while ancient authors discussed the organisation and running of the ideal city on an abstract level, More chooses to describe Utopia through a fictitious account that presents the island as existing in reality – in an elsewhere defined as “no-place”. Half in earnest, half in jest, More’s Utopia resonates with the voice of Lucian – Lucian who stands at the heart of the intertextual relation that links Rabelais’ works to Utopia, through a consistently playful approach informed by a facetious humanism.