Classics Considered

Therefore it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities I have enumerated, but it is very necessary to appear to have them. And I shall dare to say this also, that to have them and always to observe them is injurious, and that to appear to have them is useful; to appear merciful, faithful, humane, religious, upright, and to be so, but with a mind so framed that should you require not to be so, you may be able and know how to change to the opposite.  Through much of the first half of Niccolò Machiavelli's The Prince , I did not understand the reason so much malevolence is associated with the author's name.  The first seventeen chapters come across as a detailed guide or manual to being a successful ruler.  Machiavelli initially comes across as pretty fair-minded for his time; he gives examples of successful princes, discusses soldiering much in the vein of Sun Tzu (he would later write his own The Art of War ), and even...

Friday Thoughts... a new weekly feature where I talk about stuff.  Excited yet? I don't know exactly where this series will take us.  Per my blogging goals for this year , I want to share more candid thoughts about reading - reading as an experience and as a part of life.  Friday, as the week winds down, seems like a good time to reflect. This week I have been reading The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner, as well as listening to The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli.  Both of these are new authors and new books to me, perhaps an over-ambitious start to the year. As I get further and further into The Sound , I seem to be learning more about myself than Faulkner, which was not at all the intent.  For example, more than ever do I dislike reading dismal fiction, a la Thomas Hardy and, in a certain sense, Fyodor Dostoyevsky (though the latter wins me over every time).  The real world is gloomy enough; why should I read novels that hit me over the head wit...