An Unlikely Prince
The Life and Times of Machiavelli
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An Unlikely Prince
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Narrated by:
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Stephen Hoye
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By:
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Niccolo Capponi
About this listen
In this compelling new biography, historian Niccol Capponi frees Machiavelli (1469-1527) from centuries of misinterpretation. Exploring the Renaissance city of Florence, where Machiavelli lived, Capponi reveals the man behind the legend. A complex portrait of Machiavelli emerges - at once a brilliantly skillful diplomat and a woefully inept liar; a sharp thinker and an impractical dreamer; a hard-nosed powerbroker and a risk-taking gambler; a calculating propagandist and an imprudent jokester.
Capponi’s intimate portrait of Machiavelli reveals his behavior as utterly un-Machiavellian, his vision of the world as limited by his very provincial outlook. In the end, Machiavelli was frustrated by his own political failures and utterly baffled by the success of his book The Prince.
©2010 Niccolo Capponi (P)2014 Audible, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
What listeners say about An Unlikely Prince
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Lara N.
- 30-08-20
Brilliant book but the narration takes a bit of to
The biography itself is amazing but Stephen Hoye's voice takes a little getting used to. I would urge people to give it a go because Stephen Hoye's voice becomes soothing and a great companion to spend the day with
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Leonie Frieda
- 03-07-21
AT LAST THE EXPLANATION
Niccolò Capponi has successfully ’cracked’
Old Nick’s code, which is neither black nor white the subject’s is made up of shades of grey. Niccolò Capponi is probably the most accomplished historian on Florence particularly, and the Italian Peninsula. The author is strongest when reviewing the late Middle Ages and up to the end of the Renaissance. Without giving too much away, Niccolò remains, despite blood ties with the subject of this book, but he reveals the coded hieroglyphics that explain almost all of the myths about Niccolò Machiavelli and the way the nominal Republic functioned. It provided an almost flip side point of view to that which most of us hold. Reading this monumental work for their is great knowledge behind the facts presented by the Author.
As ever Capponi takes the reader on a journey that becomes so real it is often easy to hear the noisy streets, smell the clearance of the daily detritus produced by each household whether Medicean, Machiavelli or the lowliest novel. Enjoy this tremendous book, and have a myth and misunderstanding of the time that has survived for many centuries. Bravissimo - this is a brilliant work and a thoroughly satisfying often hilarious account of the so called
‘Old Nick.’ Enjoy! Leonie Frieda, London.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Jim
- 19-11-16
Engaging and Immersive
Niccolo Capponi (or Count Niccolo Capponi to give him his full title) is a member or a patrician Florentine family who can trace their residence in that city back to the 13th Century. He has a PhD in military history and numbers Machiavelli as one of his ancerstors. These qualifications come together to make for a highly informative and oddly charming book. Unlike many current historians Capponi doesn't shy away from drawing character portraits of historical figures. He's also happy to make broad but very entertaining generalisations about Florentines as a whole. In other hands that combination might come across as smug, lazy or special pleading for an esteamed ancestor but Capponi is exceptionally learned, he seems to have an encyclopaedic knowledge of Machiavelli's writings, his extensive correspondence with friends and the power brokers of Renaissance Italy and also of the political and military context within which Machiavellia operated.
So we get eye witness accounts of the struggle for Florence to maintain its' republican identity in the midst of a struggle between the French, the Holy Roman Empire and a gallery of psychotic/decadent/dim-witted Popes. We also get a real sense of why Machiavelli's contemporaries liked him to much with tales such as the one in which one of his powerful patrons helped him to blag a luxurious stay at a notoriously stingy power brokers' palace by sending ornately decorated envelopes on a daily basis which purported to contain top secret and potentially valuable intelligence. In fact they just contained a lot of ribald gossip: "I was taking a crap when I recieved your letter....." typifies the tone.
We also get a rich picture of Machiavelli as funny, clever, disadvantaged by humble roots despite Florence's claim to republican values and incapable telling a diplomatic lie when the bald truth was staring him in the face. Hence his rather turblent career.
This gets four stars rather than 5 because the production quality is good but not great and it took an hour or so before I was fully gripped. However, I'm very glad I stuck with it and now regard it as a real gem.
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