Imagining the future: the past in utopian dimension

The article deals with the study of the temporal modes “past” and “future” in the context of utopia that is understood as a space for the implementation of optimistic anticipations. The author has an issue with the role the ideas about the past transmitted by memory play in creating an image of a perfect future referred to as the sphere of utopian imagination. Three strategies of representation of the past are conceptualized based on the material as exemplified in classical utopias, philosophical and social ideas of the Russian avant-garde, as well as utopian practices of the first post-revolutionary years. Strategies for overcoming, constructing, and reconstructing not only demonstrate different attitudes to the past but also reveal its potential about the future created by utopia.