Utopía / Utopia

In 1516 Erasmus of Rotterdam published a work by his friend Thomas More. It was a scathing portrait of Renaissance Europe, accompanied, by contrast, by a description of an ideal place: Utopia, a remote island in the New World governed with moderation and where all the inhabitants lived in harmony.

What the English humanist conceived as an “ entertaining little book” and fantasy, however, ended up far surpassing its narrative framework. That critique of the established social order became a m...