Reviews of Books:Treason and the State: Law, Politics, and Ideology in the English Civil War D. Alan Orr

2003 ◽  
Vol 108 (3) ◽  
pp. 909-910
Author(s):  
Lisa Steffen
2020 ◽  
pp. 174387212091117
Author(s):  
Natalie Suzelis

This paper provides a feminist critique of theories of liberty in two of Thomas Middleton’s city tragedies. Expanding on the neo-Roman theories of liberty presented by Quentin Skinner in Liberty Before Liberalism, I connect Middleton’s city tragedies to feminist critiques from Mary Nyquist and Ellen Mieksins Wood. Close readings of Women Beware Women and The Revenger’s Tragedy reveal connections between Middleton’s radical critiques of tyranny in later theories of liberty of the English Civil War. Because Middleton’s critiques are explored through both the state and marriage relations, I argue that Middleton exposes the same contradictions of liberty in the institution of the family, providing insight into notions of slavery, servitude, and coercion under the public rule of the sovereign and in the privacy of the home. Reading such contradictions back through Middleton, can, I argue, allow for a better understanding of feminist critiques of such theories of liberty.


2008 ◽  
Vol 70 (2) ◽  
pp. 190-220 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas Dungey

AbstractThomas Hobbes sought a reconstruction of philosophy, ethics, and politics that would end, once and for all, the bitter disputes that led to the English Civil War. This reconstruction begins with the first principles of matter and motion and extends to a unique account of consent and political obligation. Hobbes intended to produce a unified philosophical system linking his materialist account of human nature to his moral and political theory. However, his materialism gives rise to a set of perceptions, imagination, and desires that contribute to the chaos of the state of nature. The sort of person that emerges from Hobbes's materialist anthropology is unlikely to be able to make the necessary agreements about common meaning and language that constitute the ground of the social contract. Therefore, Hobbes's materialism frustrates the very purpose for which it is conceived.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document