Abstract: This paper bases its discussion on Paul Ricoeur's Lectures on Ideology and Utopia and investigates how Ricoeur proposes his own dialectical conceptualization upon his own reading of Marx's classical texts and constructs his dimension of reflection in his poetics of narrative. Narrative, when bringing logic structure into events, becomes a process of rationalization or legitimization, and in this process the reality is distorted. Before it becomes absolute distortion, Ricoeur claims, the representation itself is one part of the materialistic and linguistic activities of a human person, a language of real life existed before distortion. When narrative links to such function, it tends to become a Utopia which stands out from reality. Utopia does not necessarily become part of ideology, and literary utopia has a structure of reflexivity, which leads to reexamination of our identity and our role in the existing order and to the possibility of reveal the future events. This paper tries to present how Ricoeur arrives at his interpretation of ideology, utopia and narrative meditation via the long detour, and affirms the possibility of renewal and practice in ideology and utopia as long as a human person attains the ability to imagine, write, narrate and act.

Key words: Paul Ricoeur, narrative, ideology, utopia, imagination