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Review
"A thoughtful and well-informed study of the life of the Florentine diplomat and government bureaucrat. . . . Unger presents a side of the cynical and jaded diplomat rarely known by even those who had read Machiavelli's notorious collection of practical and often amoral advice to the prospective ruler."
--Karl Rove
Product Description
He is one of the few figures in history whose name has become an adjective. Everyone has heard of him, yet few read his most important works. Miles Unger tells readers who Machiavelli really was and why he remains important today. Few political philosophers -- are more often referred to and more often misunderstood than Machiavelli. He was truly a product of the Renaissance, and as much a revolutionary in the field of political philosophy as Leonardo or Michelangelo were in painting and sculpture. He watched his native Florence lose its independence to the French, thanks to poor leadership from the Medici successors to the great Lorenzo (Il Magnifico). Machiavelli was a keen observer of people, and he spent years studying events and people before writing his famous books. They were based on observations of human nature that were as perceptive as Shakespeare's. Machiavelli was modern in another sense: he was a self-made man. Descended from minor nobility, he grew up in a household that was run by an incompetent father. He was well educated and smart, and he entered government service as a clerk. He eventually worked his way to ambassador, where he learned the art of statecraft. He became an important figure in the Florentine state but was defeated by the deposed Medici and Pope Julius II. He was tortured but ultimately freed by the restored Medici. No longer employed, he retired to his home to write the books for which he is remembered. His great work The Prince was considered too dangerous to publish during his lifetime and was published only after Machiavelli's death.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This is a fascinating new biography of one of history's most interesting and most misunderstood characters. Said to be the father of modern political science, there is a lot more to Machiavelli than the well known stereotype of the evil schemer. This book fleshes out the true story and the multifaceted nature of Machiavelli's character. It also brings to life the time he lived in, as well as the many well known (and some less well known) contemporaries he associated with including the Borgia, Leonardo da Vinci, Savanorola and Caterina Sforza. Unger writes in a beautiful prose style and it is clear that he has great knowledge of, and love for, his subject matter. He has spent time in Italy and speaks Italian so he was able to make use of primary sources with rich detail from Machiavelli's and his correspondants' own letters. Great attention is paid to Machiavelli's best known works "The Prince" and "The Discourses" but we also learn about his plays and poetry, works I was not aware of, and found to be a fascinating way of learning more about the character and proclivities of the man. The art and architecture of the age are also discussed which is not surprising considering the author's art history background.
I only occasionally read history and biographies because they so often take an interesting subject and make it dry. That is not the case with this book. It is up there with my favorite biographies such as those written by Doris Kearns Goodwin.
Highly recommended.
I only occasionally read history and biographies because they so often take an interesting subject and make it dry. That is not the case with this book. It is up there with my favorite biographies such as those written by Doris Kearns Goodwin.
Highly recommended.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
10 reviews
29 of 31 people found the following review helpful
An enthralling new biography
12 Jun 2011
Format:Hardcover
This is a fascinating new biography of one of history's most interesting and most misunderstood characters. Said to be the father of modern political science, there is a lot more to Machiavelli than the well known stereotype of the evil schemer. This book fleshes out the true story and the multifaceted nature of Machiavelli's character. It also brings to life the time he lived in, as well as the many well known (and some less well known) contemporaries he associated with including the Borgia, Leonardo da Vinci, Savanorola and Caterina Sforza. Unger writes in a beautiful prose style and it is clear that he has great knowledge of, and love for, his subject matter. He has spent time in Italy and speaks Italian so he was able to make use of primary sources with rich detail from Machiavelli's and his correspondants' own letters. Great attention is paid to Machiavelli's best known works "The Prince" and "The Discourses" but we also learn about his plays and poetry, works I was not aware of, and found to be a fascinating way of learning more about the character and proclivities of the man. The art and architecture of the age are also discussed which is not surprising considering the author's art history background.
I only occasionally read history and biographies because they so often take an interesting subject and make it dry. That is not the case with this book. It is up there with my favorite biographies such as those written by Doris Kearns Goodwin.
Highly recommended.
I only occasionally read history and biographies because they so often take an interesting subject and make it dry. That is not the case with this book. It is up there with my favorite biographies such as those written by Doris Kearns Goodwin.
Highly recommended.
31 of 34 people found the following review helpful
A disappointment
20 July 2011
Format:Hardcover
I love biographies of historical and political figures, and was excited to read about this new biography of Machiavelli. In the past two or three years a number of Machiavelli's life-and- times books have been published. The ones I've bought are good reads, but they all tend to cover pretty much the same ground. Over and over we get the same old spicy bits of Machiavelli's correspondence, his encounters with bad Borgias and shifty Medicis, woven in with dollops of poetry. Most biographers seem to have more to say about Machiavelli's colorful times than about the man himself. I'd hoped this book would be different, but it's not. I learned absolutely nothing new. It's as if the author just read a selection of other biographies then rewrote the Machiavelli story in his own style, without adding any new insights of his own. Despite the academic-looking bibliography, the book's biggest weakness is its failure to engage with Machiavelli's ideas. Unger is a journalist, and doesn't seem to have the intellectual background (or interest) needed to confront some of the great mysteries about Machiavelli: how devoted was he to republican ideals, and why does the Discourses seem to contradict the Prince? Unger goes for the easiest answers to these questions. He basically recycles old cliches about Machiavelli's opportunism and cynicism. He insists that Machiavelli had no consistent system of thought, although there's not much evidence that he's actually read enough of Machiavelli's writings to be sure of that. He hardly mentions two of Machiavelli's longest and most important works, the Art of War and the Florentine Histories. There are other popular biographies that try to get past stereotypes in their discussions of what Machiavelli thought, even though their authors are not scholars. If you read this one before the others, enjoy the storyline, but take all the confident claims about Machiavelli's ideas with a big pinch of salt.
15 of 18 people found the following review helpful
Definitely worth the read!
12 July 2011
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
In addition TO JUNEBUG'S review above, Unger has written MACHIAVELLI in a style that is neither myopic nor sketchy in nature. That is, some biographers get so bogged down into so much detail the s/he loses his/her readers' interest because of the excess and unnecessary details of the intended person's life. Similarly, some biographies are written in a watered-down style that, after one finished with the book, one wonders if this subject has been adequately covered within the confines of one book, and the reader gets an empty feeling in the stomach, saying, "Is this all there is?".
Not so with Unger. His style is flowing, with complex yet understandable ideas expressed in his sentences. This was an extremely complicated time in Florence's political life, and that of entire Italy, but yet the author presents all of the action in a clear and understandable manner. The reader really feels like s/he is a part of what is going on at that time.
I bought this book in a Kindle format, which was a mistake, and I am going to buy a hardback copy of the same book since it is very much worthy of many re-readings if one sincerely want to under this sincere, patriotic but complicated and contradictory person who lived during those turbulent times in Renaissance Italy.
This is the first review of this type that I have written (and it probably reads like it too), but, being a fan of various periods of history over the years, this was one book that placed pretty much everything at that time in its true historical place.
Absolutely worth the read!
Not so with Unger. His style is flowing, with complex yet understandable ideas expressed in his sentences. This was an extremely complicated time in Florence's political life, and that of entire Italy, but yet the author presents all of the action in a clear and understandable manner. The reader really feels like s/he is a part of what is going on at that time.
I bought this book in a Kindle format, which was a mistake, and I am going to buy a hardback copy of the same book since it is very much worthy of many re-readings if one sincerely want to under this sincere, patriotic but complicated and contradictory person who lived during those turbulent times in Renaissance Italy.
This is the first review of this type that I have written (and it probably reads like it too), but, being a fan of various periods of history over the years, this was one book that placed pretty much everything at that time in its true historical place.
Absolutely worth the read!
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