Niccolo Machiavelli

September 11, 2008 5:35 PM

The Florentine. Niccolò Machiavelli, the man who taught rulers how to rule.
posted by homunculus (10 comments total)

Not the biscuit, then?
posted by pompomtom at 5:45 PM on September 11, 2008

Master of the Senate, by Robert Caro, is a pretty good companion (or vice versa) to the Prince.
posted by KokuRyu at 7:00 PM on September 11, 2008

Melt a slice of Machiavelli cheese and a slice of Sun Tzu cheese on a biscuit, once the cheeses have merged, the resulting sandwich is known as a 'turd blossom'.
posted by hortense at 7:14 PM on September 11, 2008 [3 favorites]

R.G.H. Siu: "Ends achieved are nothing more than means expressed."
posted by dragonsi55 at 8:14 PM on September 11, 2008

Thanks a fucking lot, guy.
posted by Jilder at 8:54 PM on September 11, 2008

turd blossom shouldn't have skipped 'The Social Contract', he obviously missed the part about republics.
posted by isopraxis at 8:56 PM on September 11, 2008

I feel I should comment on this thread.
That New Yorker article is very interesting, thank you, homunculus.
posted by niccolo at 12:02 AM on September 12, 2008

The Discourses (his work on republics) is a better representation of his personal political views, as far as we know them.
posted by athenian at 1:41 AM on September 12, 2008

You should have seen what else Machiavelli was up to.
posted by jfrancis at 4:04 AM on September 12, 2008

Garrett Mattingly wrote an essay suggesting that The Prince was really just a joke. (I've always meant to look up responses to the essay.)
posted by IndigoJones at 11:31 AM on September 12, 2008