Wastelands and Wonderlands: Utopias and Dystopias in Film and Literature with Matthew Leggatt (SUNY Press, 2026)

And I thought the first sentence was a great sentence.

He reads, and I quote, I've thought a great deal in recent years about what it means to be a utopian and whether I might rightfully call myself one.

So my next question has to do precisely with this.

What does it mean to be a utopian today? And let's face it, the world is not particularly utopian at the moment.

And how can one be a utopian if one really wanted to?

It's nice you said that you like that first line, Luke, because I often have discussions with students, and they always say that they hate writing introductions.

And I love writing introductions.

They're the thing I like.

I like these sort of dramatic openings.

I'm glad that you picked up on that.

That's a really difficult question, of course.

Maybe it's the golden question at the heart of everything.

One that I tried to grapple with, as you mentioned, sorry, in the intro to the book.

So, I mean, I think utopianism means different things to different people.

As I've tried to teach utopia over the years, I've often struggled with what it means to me and whether I could legitimately call myself utopian.

a utopian.

And a lot of scholars in the space feel like, to me at least, to be like models for how one should be, how one should live, whereby sort of to be utopian is also about a kind of way of living.

And I don't always find that I can match up to that.

You know, give me a conference to go to abroad, for instance, and I'm going to take a flight.

I don't consume without conscience, but sometimes things are just convenient.

Right.

And we're busy people.

So, you know, having a kid, for example, makes me realize just how much stuff we throw away.

And I could do more to do something about it.

But you just feel like you don't have the time.