ully titled Looking Backwards: 2000-1887, this utopian science fiction novel was a landslide blockbuster hit (only third behind Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Ben Hur). Published in 1888, it broke all sorts of records for sales. Hundreds of clubs formed to discuss the novel and its ideals, and its proposal for a better world. In a word. SOCIALISM! Yes, poor Julian West, suffering insomnia, has himself put to sleep by quackish means in a crypt-like basement, only to find out (through later evidence) that his house burned down, his servant died, and nobody was there to wake him. Locked in suspended […]