Political Meritocracy in Renaissance Italy: The Virtuous Republic of Francesco Patrizi of Siena By James Hankins. Harvard University Press, 2023. Hardcover, 448 pages, $55. Reviewed by Jesse Russell. We live in a Neo-Machiavellian age. Gone are the “End of History”...
Iron and Blood: A Military History of the German-Speaking Peoples since 1500 By Peter H. Wilson. Belknap Press, 2023. Hardcover, 976 pages, $39.95. Reviewed by Jesse Russell. “Not through speeches and majority decisions will the great questions of the day be...
Rome and America: Communities of Strangers, Spectacles of Belonging By Dean Hammer. Cambridge University Press, 2023. Hardcover, 262 pages, $110.00. Reviewed by Jesse Russell. Since its inception, America has been many things, but, in a certain sense, it has always...
Global Objects: Toward a Connected Art History By Edward S. Cooke, Jr. Princeton University Press, 2022. Paperback, 336 pages, $35. Reviewed by Jesse Russell. The internet has enabled not only people but various fads to enjoy a second life. “Graphic Tees”...
Homer: The Very Idea By James I. Porter. University of Chicago Press, 2021. Hardcover, 280 pages, $27.50. Reviewed by Jesse Russell. In 2011 Harvard Professor of English and noted historicist critic Stephen Greenblatt published The Swerve. In this fascinating, if...
“The Last God’s Dream,” while certainly among the more daring of Kirk’s “experiments in the moral imagination”(as he described his literary efforts), is also one of the more successful at blending the author’s varied interests in politics, history, literature, and metaphysics.