The Rape of Lucretia and the Founding of Republics : : Readings in Livy, Machiavelli, and Rousseau / / Melissa Matthes.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Penn State University Press Complete eBook-Package Pre-2014
• VerfasserIn: Matthes, Melissa,
• Place / Publishing House: University Park, PA : : Penn State University Press, , [2021]; ©2000
• Year of Publication: 2021
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (200 p.) :; 1 illustration

The bonds among republican citizens are created, in part, through the stories told and retold as the foundational myths of the republic. In this book, Melissa Matthes takes advantage of the way in which republican theorists in different eras-Livy, Machiavelli, and Rousseau-retell the story of the rape of Lucretia to support their own conceptions of republicanism.The recurring presentation of this story as theater by these different theorists reveals not only the performative elements of republicanism but, as Matthes argues, adds to Hannah Arendt's emphasis on the oral dimensions of speech and hearing the important idea of public space as a visual field. Lucretia's story also helps illuminate the gendering of republicanism, particularly the aspects of violence and subordination that lie at its very origin. By focusing attention on this underlying and deeply gendered quality of republics, Matthes brings republican theory into fruitful dialogue with feminism.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- 1 A Conversation Between Republicanism and Feminism -- 2 Livy and the Repetition of Republican Foundations -- 3 La Mandragola and the Seduction of Lucrezia -- 4 The Seriously Comedic, or Why Machiavelli's Lucrezia Is Not Livy's Virtuous Roman -- 5 The Paradox of Rousseau's Politics and the Return to the Founding -- 6 Nouvelle Héloïse and the Supplement of Sexual Difference -- 7 Concluding Remarks -- Bibliography -- Index