Machiavelli

A Life Beyond Ideology

Paul Oppenheimer

• Publisher: Continuum
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9781441176615
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Niccolò di Bernardo Machiavelli is not only one of the most fascinating figures of the Italian Renaissance, an outstanding author and statesman, but indisputably one of its most influential political theorists, whose fundamental contributions to ideas of political power - as well as to the history of modern drama - remain astonishingly pertinent. His adventurous life led him to notable heights as a diplomat and reformer of the Florentine military, with his replacement of mercenaries by a citizen-militia. His fall, exile and eventual rehabilitation followed as briskly as his rise. Unlike many innovative thinkers about politics, he developed his radical theories of treachery and social transformation, here explored in terms of their originality, in an atmosphere of violence. Based on his experience of government, his insights led to a shift from understanding statehood, war and society as forms of finitude and stasis to those of process. All this unfolds in Paul Oppenheimer's compelling recreation of Machiavelli's life as he actually lived it.

Table of contents

• Frontispiece Map
• Title
• Contents
• List of illustrations
• Preface
• Introduction: Modern Evil and The Sack of Rome
• Machiavelli and the Changing Universe
• Family and Growing Up
• Early Education
• The Cosmic Package
• Poetry, Music and Militarism
• Murder in the Duomo
• A Boyhood Excursion
• The Lost Years
• Poetry and the Medici
• The Religious Revolution
• The World of War and Diplomacy
• Executions and an Official Appointment
• Caterina Sforza and the Crisis at Pisa
• The Military Quandary
• On the Move with the French King
• The Long French Patience
• Marriage and a Hint of Cesare Borgia
• Meeting the Captain-General
• Investigating the Sources of Power
• Retribution and Dominance
• Plans to Change the Arno
• The First Journey to Rome
• Cesare’s Downfall and the First Decennale
• Anarchy and the Citizen Militia
• The German Enigma
• Victory at Pisa
• A Government Overthrown
• Into a Tuscan Exile
• The Aftermath of Freedom
• Making History at Sant’Andrea
• Power and Memory
• The Ambush of Love
• Literary Adventures
• Reflecting on the Craft of War
• The Dream of History
• Lights before the Storm
• The Assault on Rome and a Fatal Illness
• Epilogue: The Historical Afterglow
• Notes
• Bibliography