Not only is 'Erewhon' an adventure story but also Butler's satirical inversion of English customs and philosophy in the 19th century. The explorer Higgs discovers a well organised and civilised country - apparently idyllic. However, the body politic has two ruling obsessions, disease is considered a crime and machinery is seen as a threat to the supremacy of man.

In his story Butler identified certain social and industrial conditions which have since become large moral problems. Ever present poverty and encroaching technology ensure that these problems are likely to be with us for a long time.

Fantasy 'Erewhon' may be, yet it still has a ring of truth and the power to disturb.

Collection	Narrator	Length
Victorian	Peter Joyce	9 hrs

Media	Compact Disc	Audio Tape
Media Qty	8	6
Audio Format	CD-DA	Analogue
Book Code	VI-103CD	VI-103TA
ISBN	978 1 86015 006 7	978 1 86015 432 4
Price	£22.99	£19.99

Samuel Butler (1835 - 1902) was a British writer best known for his satire Erewhon and his posthumous novel The Way Of All Flesh. He was born in near Bingham, Nottinghamshire, England, into a long line of clerics, preordained as it were to a career in church in his father's wish and expectation. Following graduation from Cambridge, he lived in a low-income parish in London during 1858 and 1859 as preparation for his ordination to the Anglican clergy; there he discovered that baptism made no apparent difference to the morals and behaviour of his peers and began questioning his faith. This experience would later serve as inspiration for his work The Fair Haven. Correspondence with his father about the issue failed to set his mind at peace, inciting instead his father's furor. As a result, in September 1859 he emigrated to New Zealand, a British colony since 1840, to put as much distance as possible between himself and his family. He returned to England in 1864 and in 1872 his satirical novel Erewhon appeared.

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