Be Like the Fox: Machiavelli's Lifelong Quest for Freedom by Erica Benner
An enjoyably revisionist biography and a warning from the past about our world today.
Niccolò Machiavelli lived in a fiercely competitive world, one where brute wealth, brazen liars and ruthless self-promoters seemed to carry off all the prizes and a new breed of leaders - super-rich dynasties like the Medici or military strongmen like Cesare Borgia - promised radical alternatives to the status quo. In the republic of Florence, Machiavelli and his contemporaries faced a choice: should they capitulate to these new princes, or fight to save the city's democratic freedoms?
In this book, Erica Benner follows Machiavelli's dramatic quest for political and human freedom through his own eyes. Far from the cynical henchman people think he was, Machiavelli emerges as his era's staunchest champion of liberty, a profound ethical thinker who refused to compromise his ideals to fit corrupt times. But he did sometimes have to mask his true convictions, becoming a great artist of fox-like dissimulation: a master of disguise in dangerous times.
Paperback | 384 pages
129 x 198 x 22mm | 281g
01 Mar 2018
Penguin Books Ltd
London, United Kingdom
English
0141974850
9780141974859
Condition: Good
A book that has been read but is in good condition. Very minimal damage to the cover, including minimal scuff marks, but no holes or tears. All pages are undamaged, with no creasing or tearing, no pencil underlining of text, no highlighting of text, no writing in margins. No missing pages.