The history of the Sevarambians
Subtitle: a utopian novel
By: Denis Veiras ; edited and with an introduction by John Christian Laursen and Cyrus Masroori.
Contributors: Laursen, John Christian.; Masroori, Cyrus.
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Published: 2006
Place of publication: Albany
Language: eng
Number of pages: 390
Subjects: Voyages, Imaginary -- Early works to 1800.; Utopias -- Early works to 1800.
Genres: Early works to 1800.
Description: "Reminiscent of More's Utopia and Swift's Gulliver's Travels, Denis Veiras's History of the Sevarambians is one of the great utopian novels of the seventeenth century. Set in Australia, this rollicking adventure story comes complete with a shipwreck, romantic tales, religious fraud, magical talismans, and supernatural animals. The current volume contains two versions of Veiras's story: the original English and the 1738 English translation of the expanded French version. Veiras's work was well known in its own time and has been translated into a number of languages, including German, French, Russian, and Japanese, while the English version has been largely forgotten.

The book has been read to teach a variety of political doctrines, and also has been cited as an early development in the history of ideas about religious toleration. It reveals a great deal about early modern English, Dutch, and French attitudes toward other cultures. One of the first utopian writings to qualify as a novel, it can be interpreted as a metaphor for human life, in all its complexity and ambiguity."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.