ABSTRACT
All utopian voyages are either fantastic or at the least extraordinary. There have been attempts to classify such imaginary voyages as ‘realistic’ on the one hand, and ‘fantastic’ on the other. The attempt to connect such fantastic states with reality may be explained as the final outcome of the Utopian’s desire to create the illusion of reality. In W. A. Eddy’s terms all journeys to the moon would have to be classed as fantastic, while most of the discoveries on earth would be realistic. Such a definition might possibly be accepted for sixteenth, seventeenth, and even the eighteenth century. The distinction between realistic and fantastic utopian journeys according to mode of travel and the nature of destination is not satisfactory. On the whole a utopian journey is fantastic. An ‘objective’ utopia, i.e. an imaginary country whose institutions are not related to its time and which has no moral significance is by definition not a utopia, but only a fantastical country.
