Post #1800501
2026-04-18 05:47 UTC
@kortschak Hm it's in my search history, so someone (maybe you?) apparently already mentioned it. Searching Inventing the Renaissance (my "context"), Palmer does cite it critically in the "Why you shouldn't believe anybody (including me) about the Renaissance".
🤷 I'm not a historian and TBQH I don't care enough to actually spend much time on this.
But most of all, I just didn't find the book all that "evil". Pragmatic, yes and outdated. But overall, his advice seemed fairly even handed.
Replies (2)
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@Merovius@chaos.social 2026-04-18 05:59
@kortschak I mean, I'm biased. I just *really loved* Ada Palmer's writing. Which is enough to humanize Machiavelli and make him a pretty sympathetic figure - not "good", but her thesis is that he was basically a patriot, wanting what's best for Florence. If I wanted to overcome my biases, I would have to read *significantly* more than I'd be willing to - I'm fine just accepting my limitations here ^^
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@kortschak@infosec.exchange 2026-04-18 06:00
@Merovius Yeah. The first time I read it I thought, "Yeah, that was all pretty obvious."