This essay examines Sir Thomas More’s Utopia in the context of Henry VIII’s divorce crisis. During this period tracts from the royal press publicized an image of Henry VIII as a disinterested philosopher-king who welcomed open debate and advice at his court. Reading Morus and Hythlodaeus’s dialogue on the subject of court counsel in light of this campaign helps us to perceive the manner in which More’s appointment as lord chancellor served the purposes of the king’s propaganda.

Researchers should cite this work as follows:

• Warner, J. C., (2025), "Sir Thomas More, Utopia, and the Representation of Henry VIII, 1529-1533", HSSCommons: (DOI: )

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1. Renaissance and Reformation

Original publication: Warner, J. Christopher. "Sir Thomas More, Utopia, and the Representation of Henry VIII, 1529-1533." Renaissance and Reformation 32 (4): 2010. 59-72. DOI: 10.33137/rr.v32i4.11591. This material has been re-published in an unmodified form on the Canadian HSS Commons with the permission of Iter Canada / Renaissance and Reformation. Copyright © the author(s). Their work is distributed by Renaissance and Reformation under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. For details, see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/.