On the Heroic Frenzies


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This vibrant bilingual edition, annotated by celebrated Bruno scholar Ingrid D. Rowland, features the text in its original Italian alongside an elegant, accurate English translation.




The Heroic Frenzies


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Giordano Bruno


Book Description

Giordano Bruno is one of the great figures of early modern Europe, and one of the least understood. Ingrid D. Rowland's pathbreaking life of Bruno establishes him once and for all as a peer of Erasmus, Shakespeare, and Galileo, a thinker whose vision of the world prefigures ours. By the time Bruno was burned at the stake as a heretic in 1600 on Rome's Campo dei Fiori, he had taught in Naples, Rome, Venice, Geneva, France, England, Germany, and the "magic Prague" of Emperor Rudolph II. His powers of memory and his provocative ideas about the infinity of the universe had attracted the attention of the pope, Queen Elizabeth—and the Inquisition, which condemned him to death in Rome as part of a yearlong jubilee. Writing with great verve and sympathy for her protagonist, Rowland traces Bruno's wanderings through a sixteenth-century Europe where every certainty of religion and philosophy had been called into question and shows him valiantly defending his ideas (and his right to maintain them) to the very end. An incisive, independent thinker just when natural philosophy was transformed into modern science, he was also a writer of sublime talent. His eloquence and his courage inspired thinkers across Europe, finding expression in the work of Shakespeare and Galileo. Giordano Bruno allows us to encounter a legendary European figure as if for the first time.




The Heroic Enthusiasts


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NOLA, a city founded by the Chalcidian Greeks, at a short distance from Naples and from Vesuvius, was the birth-place of Giordano Bruno. It is described by David Levi as a city which from ancient times had always been consecrated to science and letters. From the time of the Romans to that of the Barbarians and of the Middle Ages, Nola was conspicuous for culture and refinement, and its inhabitants were in all times remarkable for their courteous manners, for valour, and for keenness of perception. They were, moreover, distinguished by their love for and study of philosophy; so that this city was ever a favourite dwelling-place for the choice spirits of the Renaissance. It may also be asserted that Nola was the only city of Magna Græcia which, in spite of the persecutions of Pagan emperors and Christian princes and clergy, always preserved the philosophical traditions of the Pythagoreans, and never was the sacred fire on the altar of Vesta suffered to become entirely extinct.




Giordano Bruno and the Geometry of Language


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Giordano Bruno and the Geometry of Language brings to the fore a sixteenth-century philosopher's role in early modern Europe as a bridge between science and literature, or more specifically, between the spatial paradigm of geometry and that of language. Through analysis of Bruno's writings, Saiber exposes the verbal geometry of his language, and shows how his writing necessitates a crafting of space, and is, in essence, a lexicon of spatial concepts. This study constitutes an original contribution both to scholarship on Bruno and to the broader fields of early modern scientific and literary studies.




Canceling Comedians While the World Burns


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'Ben Burgis has written a clarifying, humorous and sharp as hell wake up call for the left, and political culture at large. Read this book...'Michael Brooks, host of The Michael Brooks Show Between the decline of the labor movement, the aftershocks of the falls of so-called "actually existing socialism," and the long exile of even social democrats from the levers of real power, we have gotten far too used to thinking of leftism as a performative exercise in expressing our political commitments rather than a serious effort to achieve left-wing goals in the real world. Cancelling Comedians While the World Burns calls for a smarter, funnier, more strategic left.




Vico's New Science of the Intersubjective World


Book Description

Among the classics of the history of philosophy, the Scienza nuova (New Science) by Giambattista Vico (1668–1744) was largely neglected and generally misunderstood during the author's lifetime. From the nineteenth century onwards Vico’s views found a wider audience, and today his influence is widespread in the humanities and social sciences. The New Science is often taught in courses at colleges and universities, both in philosophy and Italian departments and in general humanities courses. Despite the excellent English translations of this enigmatic book and numerous studies in English of Vico, many sections of the work remain challenging to the modern reader. Vico's New Science of the Intersubjective World offers both an in-depth analysis of all the important ideas of the book and an evaluation of their contribution to our present understanding of the social world. In the first chapter, Vittorio Hösle examines Vico’s life, sources, and writings. The second and third chapters discuss the concerns and problems of the Scienza nuova. The fourth chapter traces the broader history of Vico’s reception. Hösle facilitates the understanding of many passages in the work as well as the overarching structure of its claims, which are often dispersed over many sections. Hösle reformulates Vico’s vision in such a way that it is not only of historical interest but may inspire ongoing debates about the nature of the humanities and social sciences as well as many other issues on which Vico sheds light, from the relation of poetry and poetics to the development of law. This book will prepare students and scholars for a precise study of the Scienza nuova, equipping them with the necessary categories and context and familiarizing them with the most important problems in the critical debate on Vico's philosophy.




Philosophical Allusions in James Joyce's Finnegans Wake


Book Description

Philosophical Allusions in James Joyce's Finnegans Wake is the first study to offer complete and comprehensive explanations of the most significant philosophical references in James Joyce's avant-garde masterpiece. Philosophy is important in all of Joyce's works, but it is his final novel which most fully engages with that field. Robert Baines shows the broad range of philosophers Joyce wove into his last work, from Aristotle to Confucius, Bergson to Kant. For each major philosophical allusion in Finnegans Wake, this book explains the original idea and reveals how Joyce first encountered it. Drawing upon extensive research into Joyce's notebooks and drafts, Baines then shows how Joyce developed and adapted that idea through repeated revisions. From here, the final form of the idea as it appears in the Wake is explored. In carefully examining the Wake's key philosophical allusions, essential themes within the novel come into focus, including history, time, language, being, and perception. We see also how those allusions combine to create a network of ideas, thinkers, and texts which has a logic and an integrity. Ultimately, Philosophical Allusions in James Joyce's Finnegans Wake shows that the more one knows of the Wake's philosophical allusions, the more one can find meaning and reason in this famously perplexing book of the night.







The Debate Over the Origin of Genius During the Italian Renaissance


Book Description

This study explores a prominent Italian Renaissance theme, the origin of genius, revealing how the coalescence of a Platonic theory of divine frenzy and an Aristotelian theory of melancholy genius eventually disintegrated under the force of late Renaissance events.