The ‘Development’ of Literary Manifestations of Utopia

The authors of the Renaissance utopias, as well as their successors, always referred to at least one of their famous models – Plato – and attached great importance to being part of a well-known philosophical and literary tradition. But not only in the self-interpretation of the utopians, but also through the analysis of their materials, techniques and views, it becomes clear that the ‘beginning’ of the utopias consisted in the continuation of one or rather: several old traditions, but with the peculiarity that the new form arose from the special mixture of known, old forms, whereby the nature of the mixture allows first conclusions about the origin and structure of the utopias. The humanist authors, schooled in classical rhetoric, decided – confronted with a choice – between the principle of ‘separation of styles’, which was obligatory for the laws of genre of classical aesthetics (Aristotle), and the Christian-Jewish principle of ‘mixture of styles’ for the latter.