Fiction · 1901
Erewhon Revisited Twenty Years Later, Both by the Original Discoverer of the Country and by His Son
Twenty years after escaping Erewhon by balloon, Higgs goes back, and finds that his departure has been made into a miracle and himself into a god. There is a temple to the Sunchild, a priesthood, a liturgy and an approved account of his ascent; two professors have built careers on interpreting it, and the whole apparatus is about to be crowned with the dedication of a new temple. Higgs, travelling unrecognised, has to decide what to do about a religion founded on a balloon — and discovers that he has a son in the country, who is in danger from the same establishment.
Samuel Butler published Erewhon Revisited in 1901, the year before his death and thirty years after Erewhon. Where the first book was a satire on Victorian England turned inside out, this one is about how a religion is manufactured out of an event within living memory of the witnesses.
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Contents
- Introductory
- Chapter I — Ups and Downs of Fortune—My Father Starts for Erewhon
- Chapter II — To the Foot of the Pass Into Erewhon
- Chapter III — My Father While Camping Is Accosted by Professors Hanky and Panky
- Chapter IV — My Father Overhears More of Hanky and Panky’s Conversation
- Chapter V — My Father Meets a Son, of Whose Existence He Was Ignorant; And Strikes a Bargain with Him
- Chapter VI — Further Conversation Between Father and Son—The Professors’ Hoard
- Chapter VII — Signs of the New Order of Things Catch My Father’s Eye on Every Side
- Chapter VIII — Yram, Now Mayoress, Gives a Dinner-Party, in the Course of Which She Is Disquieted by What She Learns from Professor Hanky: She Sends for Her Son George and Questions Him
- Chapter IX — Interview Between Yram and Her Son
- Chapter X — My Father, Fearing Recognition at Sunch’ston, Betakes Himself to the Neighbouring Town of Fairmead
- Chapter XI — President Gurgoyle’s Pamphlet “On the Physics of Vicarious Existence”
- Chapter XII — George Fails to Find My Father, Whereon Yram Cautions the Professors
- Chapter XIII — A Visit to the Provincial Deformatory at Fairmead
- Chapter XIV — My Father Makes the Acquaintance of Mr. Balmy, and Walks with Him Next Day to Sunch’ston
- Chapter XV — The Temple Is Dedicated to My Father, and Certain Extracts Are Read from His Supposed Sayings
- Chapter XVI — Professor Hanky Preaches a Sermon, in the Course of Which My Father Declares Himself to Be the Sunchild
- Chapter XVII — George Takes His Father to Prison, and There Obtains Some Useful Information
- Chapter XVIII — Yram Invites Dr. Downie and Mrs. Humdrum to Luncheon—A Passage at Arms Between Her and Hanky Is Amicably Arranged
- Chapter XIX — A Council Is Held at the Mayor’s, in the Course of Which George Turns the Tables on the Professors
- Chapter XX — Mrs. Humdrum and Dr. Downie Propose a Compromise, Which, After an Amendment by George, Is Carried Nem. Con
- Chapter XXI — Yram, on Getting Rid of Her Guests, Goes to the Prison to See My Father
- Chapter XXII — Mainly Occupied with a Veracious Extract from a Sunch’stonian Journal
- Chapter XXIII — My Father Is Escorted to the Mayor’s House, and Is Introduced to a Future Daughter-in-Law
- Chapter XXIV — After Dinner, Dr. Downie and the Professors Would Be Glad to Know What Is to Be Done About Sunchildism
- Chapter XXV — George Escorts My Father to the Statues; The Two Then Part
- Chapter XXVI — My Father Reaches Home, and Dies Not Long Afterwards
- Chapter XXVII — I Meet My Brother George at the Statues, on the Top of the Pass Into Erewhon
- Chapter XXVIII — George and I Spend a Few Hours Together at the Statues, and Then Part—I Reach Home—Postscript
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About this edition
The text is free of copyright. This edition was prepared from an authoritative digitisation, processed by Bibliomancer under its own review protocol; every automated correction is recorded in its transformation log. Rights assessed for CA, EU, GB, US.
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About the author
1835–1902 · Victorian
Samuel Butler (1835–1902) was an English novelist, painter and critic: the author of the satirical utopia Erewhon (1872) and the posthumous autobiographical novel The Way of All Flesh (1903). In his last years he published The Authoress of the Odyssey (1897), arguing that the poem was written by a woman in Sicily, and plain prose translations of the Iliad (1898) and the Odyssey (1900) intended for readers without Greek.
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