Locating Melbourne and Mars in the World of Literature

Australia saw a rush of utopian fiction in the late nineteenth century. Speculative accounts of futuristic Australian cities or otherworldly societies were used to explore the social and ethical issues facing the colonies. It was in this hopeful environment that Melbourne phrenologist Joseph Fraser wrote Melbourne and Mars: My Mysterious Life on Two Planets, one of the most creative and fascinating utopian novels to come out of Colonial Victoria. Published in 1889 by E. W. Cole of Cole’s Book Arcade, Fraser’s novel compares life in the colony to a utopian existence on Mars.

These utopias were not necessarily seen as perfect societies, but as marked improvements on the author’s present. Of course, one person’s utopia is another’s dystopia, and few of the utopian cities depicted in nineteenth-century literature would be very appealing to modern readers.

Like the other utopian imaginings of the time, Melbourne and Mars allowed its author to explore his unique vision for a better world. As the novel’s protagonist begins living a dual life on Earth and on Mars, he compares dreary Melbourne to the technologically advanced utopia of the Red Planet. To better understand the historical and literary context of Melbourne and Mars, let’s look at how Fraser handles some of the key issues addressed in Colonial Australian utopias: socialism, women’s rights, science, religion, federation, and homogeneity.