Samuel Butler - Complete Works of Samuel Butler

The Complete Works of

SAMUEL BUTLER

(1835-1902)

Contents

Delphi Classics 2015

Version 1

The Complete Works of

SAMUEL BUTLER

By Delphi Classics, 2015

Samuel Butler was born on 4 December 1835 at the rectory in the village of Langar, near Bingham, Nottinghamshire, to the Rev. Thomas Butler, son of Dr. Samuel Butler, then headmaster of Shrewsbury School and later Bishop of Lichfield.

Butlers father was the rector of St. Andrews in Langar from 1834 to 1876.

Butler as a young man, 1858

Erewhon is an oddity from Butlers point of view as it is the only work that brought him great praise, and consequently profit, in his lifetime (just under 70 or the equivalent of approximately 3,150 in the early twenty-first century).

Erewhon is the word nowhere rearranged and is the name of the novels imaginary country, which is beautifully described and inspired by Butlers sojourn in New Zealand from 1860 to 1864. Some of the narrative is drawn from journalistic writings completed and published by Butler during his time there. The novel was highly praised by other authors with an interest in futuristic writing, such as George Orwell; however, some of Butlers contemporaries saw the novel as a criticism of Darwins theory of evolution, an accusation he strongly refuted as he was for a long time a supporter of Darwins views. Butler saw his novel more as a satire of Victorian society in general. It has also been suggested that Erewhon began a whole genre of similar novels by later New Zealand writers.

The story does not begin in Erewhon, but in another more familiar country, based on the sheep farm Butler ran when in New Zealand. However, the unnamed hero, also a sheep farmer and his elderly assistant Chowbok, decide to venture beyond the mountains to another unfamiliar country Erewhon. Chowboks courage fails him before long and he returns home, but the farmer continues with his journey. He discovers that Erewhon is not like his familiar home country; in Erewhon, illness is considered to be a crime and one can be imprisoned for being sick or poor; conversely, genuine criminals are seen as having an illness and given help by therapists known as straighteners, rather like the therapies given to a recovering addict. In addition, the citizens of Erewhon are highly suspicious of machines, which they fear could become so intelligent they could one day take over and for this reason machines are banned from the country. One such ill criminal, an embezzler called Nosibor, takes the farmer under his wing; the farmer falls in love with the youngest daughter, Arowhena and studies at the University of Unreason, which allows students to focus on any topic on condition that it has no practical use whatsoever! However, Nosibor is opposed to the marriage of the hero and Arowhena and the protagonist must find a way to follow his heart. An uncannily accurate and acerbic look at Western society, the novel is certain to appeal to modern readers due to its parallels with critiques of life in the twenty-first century.

The first edition

CONTENTS

The original title page

Map of part of New Zealand to illustrate Erewhon

EREWHON, OR OVER THE RANGE

ARIST. Pol .

There is no action save upon a balance of considerations. Paraphrase .

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

The Author wishes it to be understood that Erewhon is pronounced as a word of three syllables, all short thus, -r-whn.

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION

Having been enabled by the kindness of the public to get through an unusually large edition of Erewhon in a very short time, I have taken the opportunity of a second edition to make some necessary corrections, and to add a few passages where it struck me that they would be appropriately introduced; the passages are few, and it is my fixed intention never to touch the work again.

I may perhaps be allowed to say a word or two here in reference to The Coming Race, to the success of which book Erewhon has been very generally set down as due. This is a mistake, though a perfectly natural one. The fact is that Erewhon was finished, with the exception of the last twenty pages and a sentence or two inserted from time to time here and there throughout the book, before the first advertisement of The Coming Race appeared. A friend having called my attention to one of the first of these advertisements, and suggesting that it probably referred to a work of similar character to my own, I took Erewhon to a well-known firm of publishers on the 1st of May 1871, and left it in their hands for consideration. I then went abroad, and on learning that the publishers alluded to declined the MS., I let it alone for six or seven months, and, being in an out-of-the-way part of Italy, never saw a single review of The Coming Race, nor a copy of the work. On my return, I purposely avoided looking into it until I had sent back my last revises to the printer. Then I had much pleasure in reading it, but was indeed surprised at the many little points of similarity between the two books, in spite of their entire independence to one another.

I regret that reviewers have in some cases been inclined to treat the chapters on Machines as an attempt to reduce Mr. Darwins theory to an absurdity. Nothing could be further from my intention, and few things would be more distasteful to me than any attempt to laugh at Mr. Darwin; but I must own that I have myself to thank for the misconception, for I felt sure that my intention would be missed, but preferred not to weaken the chapters by explanation, and knew very well that Mr. Darwins theory would take no harm. The only question in my mind was how far I could afford to be misrepresented as laughing at that for which I have the most profound admiration. I am surprised, however, that the book at which such an example of the specious misuse of analogy would seem most naturally levelled should have occurred to no reviewer; neither shall I mention the name of the book here, though I should fancy that the hint given will suffice.