Looking at Utopia in "Millenium Hall"

In trying to decide what to write about this week, I couldn’t help coming back to Minnie’s insightful presentation on Utopian and Dystopian novels on Friday.  I know that everyone is well aware (probably more so than me) of what “utopia” means in relation to literature, but just for my own clarification I looked up a definition of the word.

Utopia: an ideally perfect state; especially in its social and political and moral aspects.

While pondering this definition, I also perused Dr. Hague’s question from Wednesday about Millinium Hall, and landed on number two: “What can you tell about the frontispiece and advertisement about the way that Scott has positioned herself in relation to this novel?” Turning to these in the book, I was reminded of our discussion of women writers and the need to protect one’s reputation during a time when women not only didn’t have the luxury of making strong political statements, but also during a time when a woman’s character—not her ability as a writer—was what (among other things) determined her success or failure as a writer.  I was reminded of this discussion through the words on the advertisement, “The Gentleman who wrote this volume, is of too much consequence to be obstinately contradicted…” Here, not only is the character of the author emphasized as chiefly important, but the author is also a man, pointing toward a kind of authorizing that protects a woman writer, allowing her to distance herself from the opinion within the novel, while appropriating her novel by attributing it to a male writer.  I was reminded of this discussion as well when I looked at these words on the frontispiece: “A Description of Millenium Hall… by a Gentleman on his Travels.” Again, here we see this same kind of authorizing.

However, something else about the frontispiece caught my attention.  While still thinking about the word “utopia,” I read these words:

“A Description of Millenium Hall… Together with the Characters of the Inhabitants, and such Historical Anecdotes and Reflections, as May excite in the Reader proper sentiments of Humanity, and lead the Mind to the Love of Virtue.”

Notice the phrase: “as May excite in the Reader proper sentiments of humanity.”  Although, as we’ve noted in Defoe’s and other’s novels, it was a popular trend to preface a novel by telling the reader how to read a particular work, I couldn’t help but think it ironic that this novel presents an ideal world, in social, political, and moral aspects, yet before the novel even begins, we are charged to read it in such a way that it incites “proper” sentiments of humanity.  Now, granted, the word “proper” could be interpreted in different ways here, but if nothing else, the insertion of “proper” implies that there is also an “improper.” In other words, there is a good way and bad way to read the “sentiments” of the novel. 

In light of our discussion on Friday, I thought that the contrast between the utopian world that the novel appropriates and the restricting guidelines concerning how to read the same novel was worth noting.