Reading Machiavelli : Scandalous Books, Suspect Engagements, and the Virtue of Populist Politics / John P. McCormick.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

McCormick, John P., author.

Contributor:

Tempio, Robert, 1975- editor.

Rohal, Matt, editor.

Series:

Princeton scholarship online.

Princeton scholarship online

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Machiavelli, Niccolò, 1469-1527--Criticism and interpretation.

Machiavelli, Niccolò.

Machiavelli, Niccolò, 1469-1527.

Populism.

Genre:

History.

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Place of Publication:

Princeton, NJ : Princeton University Press, [2018]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

To what extent was Machiavelli a "Machiavellian"? Was he an amoral adviser of tyranny or a stalwart partisan of liberty? A neutral technician of power politics or a devout Italian patriot? A reviver of pagan virtue or initiator of modern nihilism? Reading Machiavelli answers these questions through original interpretations of Niccolò Machiavelli's three major political works-The Prince, Discourses, and Florentine Histories-and demonstrates that a radically democratic populism seeded the Florentine's scandalous writings. John McCormick challenges the misguided understandings of Machiavelli set forth by prominent thinkers, including Jean-Jacques Rousseau and representatives of the Straussian and Cambridge schools.McCormick emphasizes the fundamental, often unacknowledged elements of a vibrant Machiavellian politics: the utility of vigorous class conflict between elites and common citizens for virtuous democratic republics, the necessity of political and economic equality for genuine civic liberty, and the indispensability of religious tropes for the exercise of effective popular judgment. Interrogating the established reception of Machiavelli's work by such readers as Rousseau, Leo Strauss, Quentin Skinner, and J.G.A. Pocock, McCormick exposes what was effectively an elite conspiracy to suppress the Florentine's contentious, egalitarian politics. In recovering the too-long-concealed quality of Machiavelli's populism, this book acts as a Machiavellian critique of Machiavelli scholarship.Advancing fresh renderings of works by Machiavelli while demonstrating how they have been misread previously, Reading Machiavelli presents a new outlook for how politics should be conceptualized and practiced.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Abbreviations for Machiavelli's Writings

Introduction. Vulgarity and Virtuosity

Part I

1. The Passion of Duke Valentino: Cesare Borgia, Biblical Allegory, and The Prince

2. "Keep the Public Rich and the Citizens Poor": Economic Inequality and Political Corruption in the Discourses

3. On the Myth of a Conservative Turn in the Florentine Histories

Part II

4. Rousseau's Repudiation of Machiavelli's Democratic Roman Republic

5. Leo Strauss's Machiavelli and the Querelle between the Few and the Many

6. The Cambridge School's "Guicciardinian Moments" Revisited

Summation. Scandalous Writings, Dubious Readings, and the Virtues of Popular Empowerment

Notes

Acknowledgments

Index

A NOTE ON THE TYPE

Notes:

Previously issued in print: 2018.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 23. Mai 2019)

ISBN:

9780691187914

0691187916

OCLC:

1050765661