William Crossley seeks Utopia in Belgium’s answer to Oxford

Today it is the home of a Nepalese restaurant, but 500 years ago the corner of Naamsestraat and Standonckstraat, in the Belgian university city of Leuven, was the birthplace of a book that marked a new era in European intellectual thought and writing.

Titled Utopia in December 1516 at printer Dirk Martens’ premises, it was the creation of Oxford-educated English lawyer, statesman and humanist Thomas More.

More’s intention in writing the book seems to have been to provoke debate among fellow humanists and intellectuals about the ills of contemporary European society and possible alternatives. Along with its plays on Greek words, Utopia was written in Latin, which would have limited its readership to a select elite. It was not translated into English until 1551.

To mark the anniversary, Leuven University and the city’s M Museum Leuven have organised exhibitions about the book and its world, accompanied by a programme of events in the city, called 500 Years Utopia.

Alongside talks, debates, exhibitions and an arts trail, five of the city’s restaurants are taking part in More on the Menu, offering special meals, featuring dishes inspired by recipes from the first Dutch cookbook, which was published two years before Utopia, in 1514.

Should you work up a thirst, Leuven is also the headquarters of the world’s biggest brewing company, Anheuser-Busch InBev, plus a host of smaller breweries, and boasts ‘the world’s biggest bar’ – the Oude Markt, or Old Market, a square packed with 40 café-bars.

Visitors to Leuven will find much in common with Oxford – with more than 35,000 students in a population of around 140,000, narrow medieval streets and cyclists galore.

Another familiar aspect is the university buildings scattered throughout the city centre, including the main library, in the Ladeuzeplein square, which hosts an exhibition titled Utopia & More which includes a small part of the man himself – a cervical vertebra that was preserved by his family following his execution in 1535, after he fell out with King Henry VIII. It was taken to Bruges by one of his descendants and eventually incorporated into the frame of a portrait of More, which is on loan for the exhibition from the English Convent in Bruges.

Nearby is the M Museum, where another exhibition, In Search of Utopia, explores the fast-changing world inhabited by More and his contemporaries in the 15th and 16th centuries through art, maps and other objects when the discovery of the New World and scientific advances fuelled people’s imaginations and thoughts of ideal societies.

The exhibition, curated by Leuven art historian Professor Jan Van der Stock, uses four main themes on this journey, looking first at the book, its author and his connections in Flanders.

A rich array of exhibits is used to tell these four ‘stories’, with items gathered from collections all over the world, including a first edition of Utopia from the Royal Library of Belgium, a copy of Hans Holbein the Younger’s famous painting of More from London’s National Portrait Gallery,16th century scientific instruments created by craftsmen in Leuven – not forgetting a unique coloured print from a woodcut, of the Fountain of Eternal Youth, on loan from Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum and three remarkable Enclosed Gardens altarpieces created by C16th nuns in the city of Mechelen, of intricate miniature paradises.

While Dirk Martens’ printing shop in Leuven is long gone, a visit to Antwerp provides an insight into the technology and techniques used to produce Utopia. Plantin-Moretus Museum is the former home and workplace of a printing dynasty that lasted 12 generations, from the16th- 19th centuries and houses the world’s oldest surviving printing presses.

It was also in Antwerp where Thomas More stayed with friend Pieter Gillis in 1515 and the ideas that informed Utopia crystallised in More’s mind and he began to write. Gillis also devised the Utopian alphabet that features on one page, along with a verse written in Utopian. A memorial stone marking Antwerp’s connection with Utopia was unveiled last year outside the cathedral, bearing the words, in seven languages: “Thomas More claimed to have met a traveller here in 1515 who told him about Utopia.”

Anyone travelling to Belgium to learn more will be amply rewarded.

William Crossley travelled to Leuven and Antwerp courtesy of Visit Flanders and Eurostar. visitflanders.co.

The Future is More Festival in Leuven runs until Tuesday January 17. More details here...

Eurostar operates up to 11 daily services each way between London St Pancras International and Brussels, with fares from £29 one-way. 03432 186 186. More details and offers here...