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Translation of Carlo Sini's reading of Plato's Republic as the foundation of Western anthropology.
On Political Virtue is Carlo Sini's masterful reading of Plato's Republic as the foundation of both Western politics and anthropology. In his long career, Sini has built up a complex philosophical system that includes phenomenology, pragmatism, philosophical semiotics, a rereading of the Italian tradition from Bruno to Vico, a theory of writing quite independent from anyone else, and a philosophy of "practices" that makes science and the humanities talk together—not despite their differences but because of them. First published in 2004, On Political Virtue is an inquiry into the desire for politics and what politics desires from us. By reading Plato's Republic as a theatrical piece, Sini shows how the philosophical foundation of politics is the result of a very careful mise-en-scène, a magisterial setup that Plato conjures up only to make it disappear, so that the reader is left with the supposedly "pure" power of philosophical speech deprived of context. In Sini's interpretation, Plato's aim is to create a "pure" political subject still dependent on the male gaze yet supposedly free from the chains of desire.
Carlo Sini (b. 1933) is one of the most recognized Italian philosophers. He has taught for many years at the State University in Milan. His many books include Ethics of Writing, a translation of which was published by SUNY Press. Alessandro Carrera is Moores Professor of Italian Studies and World Cultures and Literatures at the University of Houston. His many books include Fellini's Eternal Rome: Paganism and Christianity in the Films of Federico Fellini. Giorgio Mobili is a poet and translator and teaches Italian and Spanish at California State University, Fresno. He is the author of Irritable Bodies and Postmodern Subjects in Pynchon, Puig, Volponi. Santo Pettinato (d. 2022) was an interpreter at the European Parliament in Strasbourg and taught translation in Bologna, Italy.