It is no exaggeration to say that Canadian utopian literature is as old as the country itself; indeed, it is even older if we trace the origins of Canada to Confederation. As one might expect with such a topical genre, Canadian utopian literature has evolved in accordance with the nation’s historical changes.

Thomas More coined the word “Utopia” in his 1516 text by that name, punning on the ancient Greek for “good place” (eu-topia) and “no place” (ou-topia). Working from Lyman Tower Sargent’s taxonomy, we can call literary texts about alternate or imagined societies utopian literature, and under that umbrella term list three main genres: utopian fiction, which portrays a society “that the author intended a contemporaneous reader to view as considerably better than the

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Citation: Weiss, Allan. "Canadian Utopian and Dystopian Fiction". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 22 April 2025 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=19778, accessed 28 April 2025.]