Abstract

The Italian tradition of utopian studies is indebted to Luigi Firpo, who investigated Thomas More’s Utopia and the utopias of the Italian Counter-Reformation. Although Firpo was a scholar of political science, he highlighted the importance of the literary aspects of utopias. The ability to combine the political aspects of utopias with their fictional and literary aspects may be seen in his important introduction to More’s Utopia. Thus, Firpo’s school has tried to keep these two aspects united, while other political and social scientists who have devoted themselves to utopianism have observed how the present is opposed to a radically alternative project. Utopianism defines the specific mental attitude...