Editing Looking Backward (section)

{{short description|1888 Utopian novel by Edward Bellamy}}
{{use American English|date=August 2022}}
{{use MDY dates|date=August 2022}}
{{Infobox book | 
| name          = Looking Backward: 2000–1887
| title_orig    = 
| translator    = 
| image         = Looking Backward.jpg
| image_size    = 200px
| caption       = <small>Cover of the Ticknor & Co. first edition of ''Looking Backward, 2000–1887''</small>
| author        = [[Edward Bellamy]]
| illustrator   = 
| cover_artist  = 
| country       = United States
| language      = English
| series        = 
| genre         = [[Utopian novel]]<br/>[[Science fiction]]
| publisher     = • Ticknor & Co.<br/>(Jan. 1888)<br/>• Houghton Mifflin <br/>(Sept. 1889)
| media_type    = Print ([[Hardcover|hardback]])
| pages         = vii, 470
| isbn          = <!-- NA -->
| preceded_by   = 
| followed_by   = [[Equality (book)|''Equality'']] (1897)
| wikisource    = Looking Backward, 2000-1887
}}

'''''Looking Backward: 2000–1887''''' is a [[utopia]]n<ref name="UtopianNYT2000">{{cite news |author=Rothstein |first=Edward |date=February 5, 2000 |title=Paradise Lost: Can Mankind Live Without Its Utopias? |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2000/02/05/arts/paradise-lost-can-mankind-live-without-its-utopias.html |access-date=October 24, 2024 |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |pages=B7}}</ref> [[time travel]]<ref name="TimeTravNYT">{{cite news |author=Sloat |first=Warren |date=January 17, 1988 |title=Looking Back at 'Looking Backward': We Have Seen The Future And It Didn't Work |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/01/17/books/looking-back-at-looking-backward-we-have-seen-the-future-and-it-didn-t-work.html |access-date=October 24, 2024 |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |quote=an entertaining time-travel story with an upbeat ending.}}</ref> [[science fiction]] novel by the American journalist and writer [[Edward Bellamy]] first published in 1888.<ref>{{Cite web |date=January 16, 2023 |title=Bellamy, Edward |url=https://sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/bellamy_edward |access-date=October 24, 2024 |website=The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction}}</ref>

The book was translated into several languages, and in short order "sold a million copies."<ref name="Translated1MM">{{cite news |author=Teller |first=Walter |date=December 31, 1967 |title=Speaking of Books: Looking Back at 'Looking Backward' |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1967/12/31/archives/speaking-of-books-looking-back-at-looking-backward-looking-back-at.html |access-date=October 24, 2024 |work=[[The New York Times]] |pages=2, 12}}</ref> According to historian [[Daniel Immerwahr]], "In the 19th-century United States, only ''[[Uncle Tom’s Cabin]]'' sold more copies in its first years" than Bellamy's book.<ref name="BellamySynopsisNYT">{{Cite web |last=Immerwahr |first=Daniel |date=July 2, 2021 |title=The Strange, Sad Death of America's Political Imagination |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/02/opinion/us-politics-edward-bellamy.html |access-date=October 24, 2024 |website=The New York Times}}</ref> 

The novel inspired several [[Commune (intentional community)|utopian communities]]. In the United States alone, over 162 [[Nationalist Clubs|"Bellamy Clubs"]] sprang up to discuss and propagate the book's ideas.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Miller |first=Walter James |title=Looking Backward 2000–1887, ''by Edward Bellamy'' |publisher=Penguin |year=1982 |isbn=9781101213018 |chapter=Introduction}}</ref> According to [[Erich Fromm]], "It is one of the few books ever published that created almost immediately on its appearance a political mass movement."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Fromm |first=Erich |author-link=Erich Fromm |title=Looking Backward 2000–1887, ''by Edward Bellamy'' |publisher=Signet |year=1960 |isbn=9780451524126 |pages=vi |chapter=Foreword}}</ref> 

''Looking Backward'' influenced many intellectuals, and appears by title in many [[socialism|socialist]] writings of the day. Owing to its commitment to the [[nationalization]] of private property and the desire to avoid use of the term "socialism," this political movement came to be known as Nationalism (not to be confused with the political ideology of [[nationalism]]).<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Bellamy |first=Edward |date=September 1890 |title=What "Nationalism" Means |url=https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.b2870886?urlappend=%3Bseq=305%3Bownerid=9007199274017653-327 |journal=[[The Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art]] |volume=52 |issue=3 |pages=289–300 |hdl=2027/uc1.b2870886?urlappend=%3Bseq=305 |via=HathiTrust}}</ref>