This course provides an opportunity to study the works of Machiavelli in-depth. It will focus on themes in his political theory: human nature, morality and politics, the role of the prince, the analysis of virtù and gloria, the conception of the state and the idea of Machiavellian democracy. We will read Machiavelli’s political as well as literary texts and situate his arguments in their political and theoretical context, as well as exploring both how subsequent theorists understood and employed his ideas, and the major contemporary critical debates in Machiavelli’s scholarship. The seminar will therefore blend intellectual history and political theory.