SOURCE: Bellamy, Edward. “Why I Wrote Looking Backward.” In Edward Bellamy Speaks Again! Articles—Public Addresses—Lectures, pp. 199-203. Kansas City, Mo.: The Peerage Press, 1937.

In the following essay, originally published in The Nationalist in May 1890, Bellamy describes how Looking Backward evolved from his original writings of an ideal fantasy place with a social system maintained by an industrialized army to that of a utopian romance novel.

I accept more readily the invitation to tell in The Nationalist how I came to write Looking Backward for the reason that it will afford an opportunity to clear up certain points on which inquiries have been frequently addressed to me. I never had, previous to the publication of the work, any affiliations with any class or sect of industrial or social reformers nor, to make my confession complete, any particular sympathy with undertakings of the sort. It is only just...