Orti Oricellari -- Putah Creek Division
In 1515, on the banks of the Arno in Renaissance Florence, Niccolò Machiavelli walked in the famed gardens of the Orti Oricellari, discoursing with the young men to whom he later dedicated his Discourses on Livy, saying that they deserved to be princes.
In 2000, on the banks of the Putah Creek in Davis, California, a group of professors and students gathered to discuss Machiavelli's Discourses on Livy, modestly denying the claim of political scientists that they deserved to be princes. Thus was born the political theory reading group.
In 2000, on the banks of the Putah Creek in Davis, California, a group of professors and students gathered to discuss Machiavelli's Discourses on Livy, modestly denying the claim of political scientists that they deserved to be princes. Thus was born the political theory reading group.
Past and Present Readings (2000-2024)
2000-01 -- Niccolò Machiavelli, Discourses on Livy
2001-02 -- Sir Francis Bacon, Essays
2002-03 -- Baron de Montesquieu, Persian Letters
2003-04 -- Cicero, Speeches, Republic and Laws
2004-05 -- Bernard Mandeville, Fable of the Bees, and Francis Hutcheson, A Work None Dare Name
2005-06 -- Baron de Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, and Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Demons
2006-07 -- John Milton, Political Writings and Paradise Lost
2007-08 -- Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, and Benedict Spinoza, Ethics
2008-09 -- Adam Smith, Theory of Moral Sentiments and Sir Francis Bacon, New Organon and New Atlantis
2009-10 -- Plato, Protagoras, Meno, Phaedo and Phaedrus, and Aristophanes, Ecclesiazusae, Lysistrata and Wealth
2010-11 -- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Elements of the Philosophy of Right and Karl Marx, selections from The Marx-Engels Reader.
2011-2012 -- Baldassare Castiglione, The Book of the Courtier, Lucretius, De Rerum Natura, and Blaise Pascal, Pensées
2012-2013 -- Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Vols. I and II), John Locke, Reasonableness of Christianity, and David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, Natural History of Religion
2013-2014 -- Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition and Leo Strauss, On Tyranny
2014-2015 -- Benedict de Spinoza, Theologico-Political Treatise and William Shakespeare, Richard II, Henry IV, Henry V, Richard III
2015-2016 -- Herodotus, Histories and Michel de Montaigne, Essays
2016-2017 -- Carl Schmitt, Political Theology, The Concept of the Political, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, Martin Heidegger, "The Question Concerning Technology," "Age of the World Picture," Seneca, Essays and Letters
2017-2018 -- Pierre Bayle, Various Thoughts on the Occasion of a Comet; Søren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling and Repetition
2018-2019 -- Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish; Aristotle, Rhetoric
2019-2020 -- James Baldwin, Notes of a Native Son and Go Tell It On The Mountain
2020-2021 -- Wilhelm von Humboldt, The Limits of State Action; Nietzsche, Unfashionable Observations
2021-2022 -- Jeremy Bentham, Fragment on Government and Panopticon; Aeschylus, Oresteia
2022-2023 -- Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism; Benjamin Constant, Principles of Politics
2023-2024 -- Plato, Symposium and Alcibiades I; Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
2001-02 -- Sir Francis Bacon, Essays
2002-03 -- Baron de Montesquieu, Persian Letters
2003-04 -- Cicero, Speeches, Republic and Laws
2004-05 -- Bernard Mandeville, Fable of the Bees, and Francis Hutcheson, A Work None Dare Name
2005-06 -- Baron de Montesquieu, The Spirit of the Laws, and Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Demons
2006-07 -- John Milton, Political Writings and Paradise Lost
2007-08 -- Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, and Benedict Spinoza, Ethics
2008-09 -- Adam Smith, Theory of Moral Sentiments and Sir Francis Bacon, New Organon and New Atlantis
2009-10 -- Plato, Protagoras, Meno, Phaedo and Phaedrus, and Aristophanes, Ecclesiazusae, Lysistrata and Wealth
2010-11 -- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Elements of the Philosophy of Right and Karl Marx, selections from The Marx-Engels Reader.
2011-2012 -- Baldassare Castiglione, The Book of the Courtier, Lucretius, De Rerum Natura, and Blaise Pascal, Pensées
2012-2013 -- Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (Vols. I and II), John Locke, Reasonableness of Christianity, and David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, Natural History of Religion
2013-2014 -- Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition and Leo Strauss, On Tyranny
2014-2015 -- Benedict de Spinoza, Theologico-Political Treatise and William Shakespeare, Richard II, Henry IV, Henry V, Richard III
2015-2016 -- Herodotus, Histories and Michel de Montaigne, Essays
2016-2017 -- Carl Schmitt, Political Theology, The Concept of the Political, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, Martin Heidegger, "The Question Concerning Technology," "Age of the World Picture," Seneca, Essays and Letters
2017-2018 -- Pierre Bayle, Various Thoughts on the Occasion of a Comet; Søren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling and Repetition
2018-2019 -- Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish; Aristotle, Rhetoric
2019-2020 -- James Baldwin, Notes of a Native Son and Go Tell It On The Mountain
2020-2021 -- Wilhelm von Humboldt, The Limits of State Action; Nietzsche, Unfashionable Observations
2021-2022 -- Jeremy Bentham, Fragment on Government and Panopticon; Aeschylus, Oresteia
2022-2023 -- Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism; Benjamin Constant, Principles of Politics
2023-2024 -- Plato, Symposium and Alcibiades I; Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov