DISCUSSION: Machiavelli's THE PRINCE and Shakespeare's KING LEAR

Good discussion this week.  The 2 texts worked well together, especially as I happened to read THE PRINCE before KING LEAR which worked well.

Stephen started the discussion giving a brief overview of 4 theories of man's progress:

Darwin, who believed in a process of gradual change and progress; Steven Jay Gould proposes "punctuated equilibrium", where the world as a whole evolves slowly & gradually but with occasional abrupt event causing dramatic sudden change.  Thomas Coombs had a theory of a paradigm shift and Toynbee described cycles (no longer in favour) where we think something is new but it is really just a new cycle

I'll have to read more about these and think about them to be able to come to any thoughtful perspective on these theories.

Steve mentioned a few events occurring around the time these texts were written:

Start of Renaissance – 1493-1520

Machiavelli – 1470 – 1503

1453 – Ottoman Turks occupy Constantinople, end of Roman Empire (eastern empire was last bastion), end of Byzantium

1492  - Columbus encounters America; completion of Christian re-conquest of Spain

1497 – Cabot in Newfoundland

1498 – Da Vinci’s Last Supper

15_ _ -Michaelangelo paints Sistine Chapel

1517 - Luther nails his 95 proclamations to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg on October 31st.

1520 – Magellan circumnavigates; Cortez invades Mexico

1526 – Suleiman the magnificent conquers Hungary and lays siege to Vienna

Machiavelli called the 1st modern writer – why?

·         Amoralization of politics – separating from personal ethics – were connected in middle ages

·         Focus on nation state - nationalism

Jonas presented The Prince.  He asked us to consider whether Machiavelli's theories could be applied to families.  I had a hard time with this as I felt that Machiavelli was all about winning and power and that isn't the goal we want to strive for in our relationships (whether work or family and friends).  I thought that Machiavelli has a lot to offer capitalism and the corporate world but when you take ethics out of it, or morals, you are left with a pretty inhuman world (not that humans aren't capable of nasty acts of self-interest but we have the capability of looking outward and thinking and acting more broadly and this is what separates us from non-humans.)

We had an interesting discussion about how up until Machiavelli's time, ethics was rooted in religious texts – after the Renaissance we started to move towards a morality that is not rooted in religion, to a secular framework - Machiavelli was starting to move this way and so he is considered modern.  We spoke about the role of Fortune – some things happen that you can’t control but the choices you make and how prepared you are, how you react etc make a difference (50%?).  Bruce brought up luck and how some people are lucky.  I feel there is luck but I don't think there are lucky people (in the 'good luck' sense of the word - Byron pointed out that a lucky person could be a good lucky person or a bud lucky person, both would be lucky).  I think people who seem to have a lot of good luck, make their luck through seizing opportunity, taking risks, or through personalities that seem to take adversity in stride.

I mentioned that rather than just being a text to win favour with a Medici prince, I thought (based on Machiavelli's last chapter) that he was trying to encourage and support Lorenzo Medici in seizing power and maintaining it well enough to continue on and reunite all the Italian states (and maybe expand past Italy's borders).  “This opportunity must not therefore be allowed to pass, so that Italy may find her liberator."  There was not much support in the room for this view.

Steve mentioned Thomas Hobbes (5 April 1588 – 4 December 1679) and his view that people act out of self-interest and people are self-aggrandizing.  Apparently Rousseau takes an opposing viewpoint (which I'll have to keep in mind in November when we get to him).  We discussed how this view really gained ground as we moved from feudal systems or guilds to atomistic systems during the industrial age where workers get plugged into various jobs.  Unions became powerful:  What do “workers” want?  MORE.

One possible outcome to the terminal collapse of western self-interest (now global self-interest) could be the currently impending environmental Armageddon - though maybe that would be just an example of one of Toynbee's cycles - or Darwin's natural selection given the human race's star role in this Armageddon.

Laura presented King Lear.  She gave us some brief background:

Shakespeare – 1464 – Stratford-on-Avon

Prosperous family

Lived through some plagues

Queen Elizabeth and King James I

38 plays, >158 sonnets, poems

There were 4 folios of his plays produced at about the same time, these vary – so several options for some play – depends on the folio used.

In our previous texts, we have often seen madness as a symptom or result of a character’s excess passion or excess reason. We see the madness, but where is the Passion in this play?

Kent – passion and reason – is the Machiavellian minister that will speak truth to the king – this (according to Machiavelli) is who the King should keep around him but he dismisses him – keeps the flatterers around him

Edgar – passion (not a lot of reason)

Lear – passion - his love for Cordelia changes to hate; later Greed – lots of greed in this play (Edmund as well, Goneril & Regan)

Edmund – passion and cunning, some reason (fairly cold-blooded or Machiavellian)

Cordelia – reason – one of only characters who doesn’t change, is “constant”

Goneril and Regan – passion, strategy, reason?

Laura felt that Lear was being punished because he went against his duty by dividing his kingdom amongst 3 daughters (instead of keeping it intact).  I don't agree completely as he said he was dividing it now to avoid strife after he dies (if he didn't put in place a succession plan before he died).

We saw both reason and passion in this play.  I'm not sure at the end whether one quality was transcendent.  Passion caused the most change (primarily death but that seems to usually be the case) but the only ones left standing at the end were the less passionate, more reasonable characters (Kent, Edgar, Albany).  I'm still curious to explore good passion vs bad passion and good reason vs bad reason.