Aldous Huxley

Catherine Mayer—author, journalist and president of the Women’s Equality Party—talks to Five Books about her optimism for a more equal future for society by way of her favourite science fiction visionaries and their work.

Utopia is out of fashion because efforts to set one up normally end disastrously, says author Ellen Wayland-Smith. And yet, they offer a critique of society that, even today, can’t be ignored. She picks the best books on utopia.

Warnings about the future of society contained in novels such as Nineteen Eighty-Four may seem less important since the fall of the Soviet Union, but they are all too relevant to China today, argues the Chinese writer

Satire is humour used for a moral purpose, explains American political satirist P.J. O’Rourke—though it doesn’t have to be particularly funny and can be quite dark. Here, he chooses five classic works of political satire, books that lay bare the shortcomings of not only communism and fascism but also the two-party system and the quest for a perfect society where everyone is happy.

The Australian economist and author of Zombie Economics says we need to inspire people with a view of a better society. In short, we need a new utopia.

States of ecstasy (from the ancient Greek ekstasis, meaning ‘standing outside’) are moments when you lose your ordinary sense of self and feel connected to something greater than you. It can be euphoric, but it can also be terrifying, says the philosopher Jules Evans. Here he selects five books that explore the significance and power of these surprisingly common experiences.