The Prince - Softcover

Niccolo Machiavelli

Softcover

ISBN 10: 160047487X ISBN 13: 9781600474873

Publisher: Wasteland Press, 2018

Synopsis

What must a ruler sacrifice to obtain power—and keep it?

Written amid the political chaos of Renaissance Italy, The Prince is Niccolò Machiavelli’s uncompromising examination of ambition, authority, war, and human nature. Blunt, analytical, and often unsettling, the work shattered conventional political thought by separating morality from effective rule.

Machiavelli does not describe the world as it ought to be. He describes it as it is.

For centuries, The Prince has been studied by kings, politicians, generals, philosophers, and revolutionaries alike. Its insights into fear, loyalty, manipulation, and the pursuit of power remain as relevant today as when they were first written.

Provocative and enduring, this landmark work stands among the most influential books ever written on politics and leadership.

About this title

Review

When Lorenzo de' Medici seized control of the Florentine Republic in 1512, he summarily fired the Secretary to the Second Chancery of the Signoria and set in motion a fundamental change in the way we think about politics. The person who held the aforementioned office with the tongue-twisting title was none other than Niccolò Machiavelli, who, suddenly finding himself out of a job after 14 years of patriotic service, followed the career trajectory of many modern politicians into punditry. Unable to become an on-air political analyst for a television network, he only wrote a book. But what a book The Prince is. Its essential contribution to modern political thought lies in Machiavelli's assertion of the then revolutionary idea that theological and moral imperatives have no place in the political arena. "It must be understood," Machiavelli avers, "that a prince ... cannot observe all of those virtues for which men are reputed good, because it is often necessary to act against mercy, against faith, against humanity, against frankness, against religion, in order to preserve the state." With just a little imagination, readers can discern parallels between a 16th-century principality and a 20th-century presidency. --Tim Hogan

From the Publisher

Here is the world's most famous master plan for seizing and holding power. Astonishing in its candor The Prince even today remains a disturbingly realistic and prophetic work on what it takes to be a prince . . . a king . . . a president. When, in 1512, Machiavelli was removed from his post in his beloved Florence, he resolved to set down a treatise on leadership that was practical, not idealistic. In The Prince he envisioned would be unencumbered by ordinary ethical and moral values; his prince would be man and beast, fox and lion. Today, this small sixteenth-century masterpiece has become essential reading for every student of government, and is the ultimate book on power politics.

Edition details

• Publisher: Wasteland Press
• Publication date: 2018
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 160047487X
• ISBN 13: 9781600474873
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 180