57 pages • 1 hour read
Edward BellamyLooking Backward
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1888A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 15-22Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 15 Summary
The Leetes take West to a public library. They tell him he is lucky to now have so many new great works of literature to experience. Dr. Leete explains their social advancements have ushered in an age of art and science unmatched in history. West asks about the publishing industry. Dr. Leete explains that everything is self-published now at the expense of the author and published by the state without any censorship whatsoever. The popular books return enough credit to the author—via a version of royalties—to give the author a reduction in their usual work hours, in order to write more, and the most successful authors can thus spend their career only writing. The value of literature—as well as of art and music—is determined entirely by its popularity with the people.
West believes that at least his century’s “free newspaper press” must have survived the changes to the country (97). Dr. Leete responds that 19th-century newspapers were primarily for profit and controlled by the wealthy. Instead, popular opinion is published by the author in the form of pamphlets or by newspapers run by groups of interested people, by their own expense withdrawn from their annual credit. West notes that artistic success and “inventive productiveness” are the only ways that a person can avoid serving in the industrial army (99). Dr. Leete notes that after age 33, people can also choose to retire early in exchange for a reduced credit allowance for the rest of their life. This smaller allowance is enough to live on without luxury.
Chapter 16 Summary
Edith greets West in the hallway before breakfast the next morning. She woke up early each morning to make sure West did not go on walks alone in the city again. West thanks her again for saving his “reason” when he had the identity crisis two days before (101). Her eyes tear up, she blushes, and they bond over how strange this experience has been for both of them. He wonders whether he might have known them and asks who they were, but Edith avoids the question.
Dr. Leete takes West to the central warehouse. On the way, West tells Dr. Leete that he intends to become a citizen of the new century, and he asks how he can enter the system like everyone else. Dr. Leete assures him he will have a home and a profession eventually but that he is happy to have West as a guest for a long time first. Dr. Leete has already told other people of West’s existence, and the entire nation is interested in his story. He tells West that it is obvious that his profession will be that of a historian of the 19th century.
Chapter 17 Summary
The central warehouse is an impressively organized system, like a giant factory. On the way back home, West asks Dr. Leete who is in charge of it all. Dr. Leete explains the system is so perfect that it requires very little management at the top levels. The desires of the people determine what is made, and the administration merely makes sure it happens. They discuss how the cost of goods and services are determined. Dr. Leete notes that the amount of labor is directly proportional to something’s cost, with some exceptions; the government makes extra effort to keep the cost of staples low, and some goods are listed at a higher cost when the materials needed to make them are rarer.
The head of the industrial army is the President of the United States, who is the “general-in-chief” (110). Promotion to the president is achieved from the bottom up; every president has to go through the industrial army first (disqualifying anyone in the arts). Citizens are promoted within their professions based on their achievements to be officers; the best officers are selected for promotion to guild general—by the vote of retired members of that professional guild, because they no longer have any personal stake in industrial management; then the best of the guild generals is selected for promotion to become a general of one of the 10 main departments, also by a similar alumni vote; the president is than elected by all retired people in the nation from among all past department generals who have been retired for at least five years.
Chapter 18 Summary
That evening, after the women retire, West and Dr. Leete discuss life after age 45. West notes it is so young an age that some people might resent retiring, but Dr. Leete assures him that while some people spend the rest of their lives in leisure—traveling or socializing—others use the time to pursue professional interests they are passionate about. Dr. Leete explains that everyone looks forward to their 45th year as a kind of rebirth. In the year 2000, life expectancy has reached 90 years, and people at age 45 are as healthy as 35-year-olds in the 19th century.
Chapter 19 Summary
The next morning, West visits Charlestown and notices the prison is gone. During breakfast, Dr. Leete explains that there are no jails; all “cases of atavism” are treated in hospitals (118). Crime, in a world where nobody is desperate for possessions or survival, is considered the result of ancestral traits. Everyone is well-educated, too, which further reduces crime. Since most crime used to be motivated by money or ignorance, the little crime that is left is motiveless and thus treated as the result of illness.
The need for lawyers is reduced. There are still trials, but falsehood is so despised that almost always the defendant pleads guilty if they are guilty. The idea that “lying has gone out of fashion” is shocking to West, but Dr. Leete explains it is another consequence of eliminating inequalities between people (120). Today, judges oversee trials and serve as advocates for both sides. There is no need for a jury because justice is the only thing motivating the judges.
West asks more questions about the structure of the government, and Dr. Leete explains that while municipal governments still exist, the states have been disposed of in favor of a centralized hierarchy. Congress rarely considers passing a new law, because there is nothing left to make laws about, especially since 99% of laws in the 19th-century concern private property. There is no need for police anymore because crime has been all but eliminated. Dr. Leete compares the 19th century to an upside pyramid, where constant laws and policing are needed to keep it “upwrong” (123).
Chapter 20 Summary
That afternoon, Edith accompanies West to the underground chamber they found him in. West is no longer affected by the time travel experience; the past feels remote to him now. West feels pity for his 19th-century friends rather than sorrow. The one exception is Edith Bartlett; when he tells Edith Leete about her, they both begin to cry about how sad she must have been when she believed her fiancé dead. Edith reminds him that she has been dead a century now, and West reflects that his feelings for Edith Bartlett have all but faded now.
Chapter 21 Summary
After breakfast the next morning, Dr. Leete takes West on a tour of the universities. He explains that higher education is now considered as obligatory and normalized for all young people. Because higher education is standardized at large quantity, it is also much cheaper than it used to be. Because nobody works until age 21, childhood is entirely dedicated to education. Neither is higher education considered opposed to future professions in manual labor because education has been released from class-based biases.
West objects that not everyone has the intellect to benefit from a higher education. Dr. Leete explains that cultivating land that lacks natural fertility can actually improve more than cultivating land that is already fertile can. Thus, there is more to gain as a society by educating those considered less susceptible to higher education. A cultured individual prefers to spend their time with other cultured individuals; for everyone to have the educated neighbors they desire, everyone must be educated.
In visiting the universities, West is especially struck by the dedication to physical activities like athletics. Dr. Leete explains that education is considered to be important for both body and mind in the year 2000. West reflects on how fit and healthy everyone is in the present compared to his time. Mental illness and death by suicide have been all but eliminated because, according to Dr. Leete, they were caused by the mode of life of the 19th century. Afterward, Dr. Leete tells West his opinions will be highly valued because much of what is known about the 19th century is conjecture.
Chapter 22 Summary
The Leetes return to the dining house for dinner. West tells Dr. Leete he is convinced of the perfection of present society and that if he returned to the 19th century tomorrow, his contemporaries would agree. But he suggests that his 19th-century companions would be skeptical that it is possible. They would wonder how everything is paid for considering the total annual product of the United States in 1887 was merely $400 per person, if split equally among all citizens. Dr. Leete explains that many governmental costs in the 19th century have been unburdened in the present: military, tax revenue services, police and prisons, and corruption among politicians. Those costs alone, Dr. Leetes argues, would be enough to fund the current government.
Dr. Leete compares the current economic system to a “great mill” (142). The way one textile mill in the 19th century found a way to increase production of calicoes through the adoption of machines and the division of specialized labor is how the current United States has made the entire economy more efficient—by turning the entire nation into one giant mill. Dr. Leete ends by saying that West has yet to even see how luxurious their lives are.
Chapters 15-22 Analysis
In these chapters, Bellamy expands on his description of his utopia through Dr. Leete, focusing on some critical cultural sectors of the society not yet addressed. Special attention is paid to the life of the mind. The future government invests heavily in education, and all citizens under age 21 receive a college education, which emphasizes bodily health and the cultivation of minds previously not considered worth educating—those without “natural fertility,” to use West’s metaphor of farming (129). The idea is that, because educated individuals do not enjoy the company of the uneducated, anything short of complete education for all citizens will result in inequalities across the society. This is, as usual, a way for Bellamy to criticize the nature of higher education in the 19th century, which is expensive and often used only as way for the wealthy to socialize among their peers. This highlights Utopian Concepts as a Way to Motivate Change as Bellamy can envision a so-called perfect society, one in which everyone is educated equally, in order to direct 19th-century readers toward that goal.
Bellamy also criticizes the treatment of writers in the 19th century by explaining how writers in the future will never be censored and that they will earn a living based on merit rather than their connections. Bellamy himself was a journalist, and he extends his freedom of the author to newspapers; because everyone in the nation is educated, the people are supposedly good judges of both art and truth, and so which voices become amplified in the culture never are determined by populist demagogues taking advantage of the ignorant. Since financial motives have been eliminated, the pursuit of journalism and art, according to Dr. Leete, are pure. Here, Bellamy is presenting a very self-serving vision of the future and one which seems especially rose-colored in light of misinformation today. In fact, Bellamy immediately contradicts himself when he presents the governmental structure of the United States, which is voted upon by only those citizens who are no longer part of the industrial army, creating a system of censorship along generational lines. This highlights A Vision of Utopia That Is Racist and Patriarchal. His publishing system suggests popularity will be a solid determining force for quality; but popularity, of course, is determined by a society and its biases, further exacerbated by the control of government exclusively by people retired from the industrial army.
Over the course of these chapters, Dr. Leete repeatedly tells West how “simple” the world has become. However, there is a complicated balance between two contradictory forces: the idea that collective thinking and compassion for all humanity is the secret to forming a perfect society, in contrast to the Age of Individuality, and the idea that individual freedoms have been completely preserved and even increased in that perfect society. Dr. Leete glorifies the public spaces of the city and yet they eat inside a private room at the public dining house. Workers labor for the good of all, and yet motivation is based on the prospect of promotion to management positions. Dr. Leete condemns the 19th-century government for telling the people “what they were to eat, drink, or wear” (108), but he also espouses the benefits of standardization in making society more efficient. Bellamy’s system is essentially the harnessing of individual expression for the good of all individuals, which is far from simple. This then attempts to speak to Ideology of Solidarity as a Driving Force. Bellamy hopes to unite readers around an ideology of the group in order to lead them to this so-called egalitarian society. Bellamy’s idea of solidarity revolves around a presumptive “norm,” presented as uncontroversial in the eyes of Bellamy’s readership as he stresses how similar to today the utopia is. The inherent contradiction between the collective good and the preservation of individual freedoms highlights how the utopia only preserves the notion of individual freedom along gendered, racial, and sexual lines.
Bellamy’s criticisms of the 19th century are amplified in these later chapters. In Bellamy’s day, many knew the system was unfair, but the majority of the middle class believed that unregulated capitalism was the best possible economy for growth and prosperity. Dr. Leete attacks this idea in Chapter 12. He argues that a system that relies on competition generates waste where one based on cooperation is both more fair and more efficient in the production of wealth. He characterizes every capitalist’s motivation as “selfish” and explains why selfishness sabotages the possibility of progress (144). Beyond moral outrage at the treatment of the lower classes, Dr. Leete finds it unbelievable that any community would support an economic system that, by its nature, is always looking for ways to “starve” the people (137). Bellamy has already appealed to the pathos of his readers; now he appeals to their logos. His new system would prevent recessions and make everyone richer. This two-pronged approach allows Bellamy to craft a more well-rounded argument, potentially snaring readers who may value logos or pathos more highly than the other.
Most of these chapters are spent on descriptions of the society, but Bellamy does check in on the psychology of West. West’s past to him now feels distant. West, engaging in ableist language, compares his feelings for the past to a “paralyzed” limb that can now be amputated (126). West no longer even has feelings for his fiancé, just distant pity for her that she had to deal with his presumed death. As Edith points out, West’s recovery is incredible, because there is “nothing” in the world that “does not seem strange to you” (102). However, Edith is also a reason for that recovery; while Dr. Leete prepares West to become a citizen of the year 2000 through reason, Edith prepares West to become a citizen in the present emotionally. These sections are also problematic in their suggestion that women are romantically interchangeable.
