The Altrurian romances

de William Dean Howells, Clara Kirk, Rudolf Kirk

The Altrurian Romances（1968）of William Dean Howells consists of three utopias: A Traveller from Altruria(1894), "The Letters of an Altrurian Traveller" (1893-94), and Through the Eye of the Needle (1907). The Altrurian traveller, Aristides Homos, visits the United States in 1892 and stays there for about a year and a half, visiting a New Hampshire mountain resort hotel, New York City and Chicago. These romances record Homos's criticisms of the social, political, and economic conditions of the industrial, capitalistic and "plutocratic" America. The Commonwealth of Altruria has attained the Utopian dream of brotherly equality through literal applications of the principles of "liberty, equality, and fraternity." Howells uses Homos as his spokesman in such a way that Homos's account of his country implies every insulting criticism of America. By letting the Altrurian Homos and his American wife describe the conditions of Altruria where complete social, political, and economic equality has been attained, Howells effectively draws the people's attention to his call for social justice through return to the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution，especially through the strict observance of the principles of "liberty, equality, and fraternity." -- University of Ryukyus Repository.