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I'm weirdly pleased that The Prince lives up to its reputation: it is indeed Machiavellian. Here's his advice on conquering self-governing states (i.e. democracies): "The only way to hold on to such a state is to reduce it to rubble." Well then.I'd like to say that any guy whose last name becomes a synonym for evil is a badass, but Machiavelli wasn't; he was a failed minor diplomat who wrote this in a failed attempt to get reemployed. Stupid attempt, too; anyone who hired him would be advertisin...
In this book, Machiavelli makes his purpose clear: how to get power and keep it. No happiness. No warm and fuzzy pats on the back. Definitely no hugs. No words of encouragement. Definitely nothing about being nice. Being nice, in politics, in war, in struggles for power, often ends with one person winning and the other person being in prison, disgraced, exiled, or dead. That was the context in which Machiavelli wrote this book. Italy at the time was a collection of warring states, not united. On...
The Prince is a political treatise written by a Florentine diplomat, Niccolo Machiavelli. In a time of foreign invasion and rule of the different parts of Italy, Machiavelli wrote this treatise and dedicated it to Lorenzo di Piero de' Medici of the Medici family in the hope that one strong ruler will emerge from that powerful house and drive the foreign rulers away from Italy. This treatise is mainly concerned with the acquisition and preservation of power. It contains Machiavelli's detailed a
This is no Little Prince, that's for sure. You must kill the fox, burn the rose, murder the businessman, if any of them tries to take control over your princedom. There's no time to be nice! There's only time to seem to be nice. At the end of the day, it is better to be feared than loved, if you can't be both. Nevertheless, keep in mind chapter 23.The Prince was written in the 16th century and a couple of its ideas are too contemporary. It is a major treatise that influenced several political le...
I don't know how come I never reviewed this one but recently I was visiting this friend of mine in south India, Pramod (yes, the one from Goodreads), when he showed me this not-so-popular smaller piece, allegedly written by the author in his last days, 'Le Gente' and never published - for common people about how they can succeed in social life using diplomacy. There were only twenty copies of same written in 19th century, of which Pramod's was one. Since he is a sort of book-worshipper, he won't...
How to run things and hopefully remain popular but not give a monkey's if they hate you. How to instil enough fear in people that they at least show respect to your face.Plenty of good lessons here for a politician, but adaptable by anyone if you don't mind being thought evil by your nearest and dearest. And I don't.
'We can say that cruelty is used well... when it is employed once for all, and one's safety depends on it, and then it is not persisted in but as far as possible turned to the good of one's subjects.'The Prince is unlike anything I've read before. In many ways it feels like a truly evil book. Stalin, for example, kept an annotated copy of it. It reads as the blueprint for tyrants, despots, and politicians around the world - a guide to how the world of the powerful and the powerless truly works.
I've given this remarkable book 5 stars not because it enjoys such a grand reputation, but because I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Machiavelli may have been the only person in history to give such sound advice to his prince and at the same time to reveal an astonishing understanding of human nature. With very little imagination on the part of the reader, his thoughts apply equally well today as they did more than 500 years ago. Mankind is just as good—and as evil—as it was half a millennium ago...
That single statement boys and girls is the crux at the heart of the matter resting at the bottom-line of Niccolo Machiavelli’s world-changing classic on the defining use of realpolitik in governance and foreign policy. Despite popular perception, Machiavelli, whose name has often been used as a synonym for political ASSHATery, was not arguing that it’s better to be immoral, cruel and evil than to be moral, just and good. Rather, Machiavelli was demonstrating, through reasoned analysis based
Il Principe = The Prince, Niccolò MachiavelliThe Prince is a 16th-century political treatise by the Italian diplomat and political theorist Niccolò Machiavelli. Machiavelli said that The Prince would be about princedoms, mentioning that he has written about republics elsewhere, but in fact he mixes discussion of republics into this in many places, effectively treating republics as a type of princedom also, and one with many strengths. More importantly, and less traditionally, he distinguishes ne...
Italy in the early 1500's was a sad, dispirited land of constant wars, deaths, destruction, political betrayals, schemes of conquest by greedy aristocrats, trying to enlarge their petty Italian states, invasion by ruthless, foreign troops, from France, Spain, the Swiss, rulers being overthrown and killed, armies continuously marching, towns sacked, fires blazing, black smoke poring into the sky , mercenary soldiers, slaughtering the innocent, pestilence spreading, only the wise, the strong and t...
So, it seems there has been a bit of a mix up.I had no idea what this was about, I just assumed I was going to read a fairly raucous fictional story about a Prince. So you can imagine my shock when I read the opening chapter. I feel bad for giving this a one star as this is entirely my fault however it meets all the criteria, I had to drag myself through, I understood little and the only satisfaction I received was reaching the end. Sorry Machiavelli.
A young colleague of mine recently said ‘management is easy’. I smiled enigmatically and considered buying him a copy of ‘The Prince’ but I fear it would be wasted. I am now on my third copy of this book which, alas, I can only read in English. The George Bull translation (as reprinted in 1995) is the version I currently refer to.I first read this book when studying economic history at high school in the second half of the last century. I was intrigued by Machiavelli’s advice even though I had l...
The promise given was a necessity of the past: the word broken is a necessity of the present. No, you don't understand. It is double pleasure to deceive the deceiver. I need someone to write a romance book about a hero that would be the exact replica of Niccolò Machiavelli. Never attempt to win by force what can be won by deception. Insightful, witty, manipulative, unscrupulous, ruthless, brilliant man of my dreams who'd rather overthrow the status quo than try to
I decided it was time to find out for myself what Machiavelli was about. After all, he is one of a small group of writers who have lent their names to an adjective in the English language (Dickens, Orwell and Kafka are others I can think of).“The Prince” is a short tract, and whilst it had its moments, I found much of it quite dull. I hadn’t expected that. In the edition I read, the translator says in a foreword that “my aim has been to achieve at all costs an exact literal rendering of the orig...
This book is the perfect representation between the best and the worst of House Slytherin in the Harry Potter verse, and that is how I presented it to my class. I got an A on the paper, so it does make sense. “Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.” Yes Machiavelli, at least you make some logical sense. Here is my reasoning about Slytherin and The Prince: Slytherin House, which is known for cunningness, astuteness, ambition, thirst for power, self-preservati...
I had a really hard time getting into this book because, quite frankly, it wasn’t what I was expecting. Let me say, straight up, I’m not generally a fan of books on history. I like reading about certain parts in history but this wasn’t my cup of tea at all. Kudos to all Goodread members who thought this book deserved five stars. I’ll stand by my lonely one star and call it a day...
I think this was the first time that I read this book from cover to cover rather than dipping in and out of it, I feel that it's reputation is bleaker than it's bite, it seems no more cynical than observing to oneself, when an American political figure says something, that there is an election coming up, and it is far less cynical, or brutally practical than The Memoirs of Philippe de Commynes in my opinion.It stands out perhaps on two grounds, one it completely avoids conventional Christian mor...
Being a morally virtuous leader will increase the probability of your failure, which can lead you to your downfall, but adhering to your intellectual virtues and vices (when necessary) will in all likelihood bring you well-being and prosperity. It's that simple, Machiavelli says!Niccolò Machiavelli's (1469-1527) The Prince (1513) is a rulebook for rulers or those who aspire to be one. He dedicates and gifts this little book to Lorenzo de Medici the young new ruler of Florence who likely never re...