"Learned, searching essays directed toward the recovery of the notion of tyranny from Machiavelli's almost successful attempt to suppress it. Anyone who wants to understand modern politics will profit from Waller Newell’s eye-opening analysis."
Harvey Mansfield, Harvard University and Hoover Institution, Stanford University, California
"In this extraordinary new book Waller Newell offers the first systematic account of the difference between ancient and modern tyranny. The author argues that modern tyrannies are the products of modern philosophy. To understand tyranny aright we must view it as part of the revolutionary effort of modern philosophers to provide the tools for the conquest of nature, including human nature. This book should prove an instant classic taking its place alongside other seminal studies of modern totalitarianism by the likes of Hannah Arendt and Raymond Aron."
Steven B. Smith, Alfred Cowles Professor of Political Science, Yale University, Connecticut
"A powerful challenge to recent, more democratic, and ethical readings of Machiavelli. Ancient and modern understandings of tyranny are fundamentally different, Newell argues, because they rest on different understandings of nature - both cosmic and human. Whereas the classical view of tyranny to be found in the works of Plato, Aristotle, and Xenophon is essentially erotic, the modern view originated by Machiavelli consists in a will to master and transform human beings as well as the world in which we live."
Catherine H. Zuckert, University of Notre Dame, Indiana and editor of Political Philosophy in the Twentieth Century
"A distinguished scholar of the history of political philosophy elaborates a study of tyranny … that dark but recurring phenomenon. By focusing on Machiavelli as the hinge of fate in the theory and meaning of tyranny, Newell reveals the historical dynamic that has brought into being the peculiar combination of the demonic and the prosaic that characterizes tyranny in our late modern epoch."
Thomas L. Pangle, University of Texas, Austin
"A masterful account of the fatal evolution of tyranny from ancient to modern and from charm to terror … offers insightful analyses of political thought from Plato to Hobbes and beyond."
Barry Strauss, Cornell University, New York
"The term 'tyrant' sounds antique, but Newell's Tyranny awakens us to its insidious, all-pervasive modern form, ideologically aimed at nothing less than commandeering human nature. This monumental work is an advance in the history of consciousness, worthy of the closest reading as it takes its place on the shelf of modern classics of political thought."
Norma Thompson, Yale University, Connecticut
"For almost half a century now, scholars have focused their attention on republicanism, both ancient and modern, and tyranny has received short shrift. In this remarkable and subtle work, published on the 500th anniversary of Machiavelli's drafting of The Prince, Waller R. Newell redresses the balance, examining tyranny as a practical phenomenon; juxtaposing its analysis in Plato, Xenophon, and Aristotle with the account provided by Machiavelli and Hobbes; and tracing its transformation in modern times to the repudiation of eros and the metaphysics attendant on it by the Florentine political philosopher and his English admirer and to their embrace of a doctrine that asserts that everything, including human consciousness, is reducible to matter in motion. If Newell is correct, as I fear he is, tyranny is apt to be no less profound a threat to human flourishing in our time than it was in the concluding century of the past millennium."
Paul A. Rahe, Hillsdale College, Michigan
"With great skill and learning, Newell has written a beautiful book that virtually creates a new subject, one of immense importance to everyone who thinks seriously about politics. I recommend it without reservation."
Stanley Rosen, Boston University
"Newell's provocative arguments will unsettle preexisting categories and prompt readers to explore novel questions. Newell has produced a rich, timely, and imaginative study on a subject of perennial philosophical and political significance. His erudition and imagination shine through on every page."
Ryan Balot, University of Toronto
"… Newell provides the means to understand what's at stake, and, perhaps, the lessons to defeat the rough beast that slouches toward us."
Robert Sibley, Ottawa Citizen
"… deeply ambitious … Newell's aim is to make sense of tyrannical regimes … [his] book is deeply impressive …"
Aaron MacLean, The Washington Free Beacon
"… this is an important and rich book, full of original interpretations and insights."
Giovanni Giorgini, The Review of Politics
"… extremely illuminating … what Newell’s book shows is the stark reality that far from being a purely exceptional phenomenon, tyranny has in fact haunted the project of modernity from the beginning."
Matthew Ellison, Cambridge Humanities Review
"Waller R. Newell’s book Tyranny: A New Interpretation has everything a book can offer to a serious reader of political philosophy … Newell has not only integrated and thoroughly applied the intellectual intentions of great thinkers like Strauss or Voegelin, but he has tried to challenge them in a moderate and decent way."
András Lánczi, VoegelinView
