Germana Ernst. Il carcere, il politico, il profeta: Saggi su Tommaso Campanella.

Pisa and Rome: Istituti Editoriali e Poligrafici Internazionali, 2002. Pbk. 192 pp. index. append. 23 [euro]. ISBN: 88-8147-281-1.

Tommaso Campanella might be called the "ninth philosopher of the Italian Renaissance." I begin with this reference to Paul Oskar Kristeller's Eight Philosophers of the Italian Renaissance (1964) because he did not include Campanella in his book. Kristeller thought that this philosopher was "too political and too diffuse" (John M. Headley, Tommaso Campanella and the Transformation of the Worm [1997], xxiii). Ernst's essays show that Campanella was indeed extraordinarily diffuse both in his philosophical and in his political ideas. In order to explain Campanella's thought, Ernst has to go back and forth through several of the philosopher's works simultaneously. It is not a question of arguing that Campanella explored a concept in one book and then another. But in order to capture this late Italian Renaissance philosopher's ideas, she has to survey his pro- and anti-Spanish monarchy writings, his poetry written throughout his life, his defense of Galileo, and his more strictly philosophical works in successive pages and even in successive paragraphs. "Diffuse" is certainly an apt descriptor of this philosopher.

Ernst's thesis on Campanella's thought is succinctly caught in the work's title. Imprisonment, politics, and prophecy are the themes that pervade his thought. Throughout his life (1568-1639), this Dominican was influenced by Aristotelianism, anti-Aristotelianism, Platonism, Stoicism, and, above all, the naturalistic philosophy of Bernardino Telesio. These congeries of influences help explain the complicated nature of Campanella's thought as well as the reasons for his frequent imprisonments, his ideas on politics, and his prophetic goals.

Tommaso Campanella spent much of his life in prison (1594-96, 1597-98, 1599-1626); he finally fled Rome and Italy, and spent his remaining years in exile under the protection of Cardinal Richelieu, working for the conversion of the Protestants and trying to influence French royal policy in an anti-Spanish campaign. (A good, English-language survey of Campanella's life may be found in Bernardino M. Bonansea, Tommaso Campanella: Renaissance Pioneer of Modern Thought [1969], 23-32.)

For a man who spent twenty-nine years in prison, it is perhaps no wonder that Campanella's philosophy constantly adhered to the principle that, while the body may be imprisoned, the human spirit remains free. This concept explains the first part of Ernst's title and book. Although in prison, Campanella was able to develop a political philosophy of freedom as well. In this regard, he surprisingly rejected Machiavelli's negative ideas on human nature and politics that are found in The Prince and in The Discourses on the First Ten Books of Titus Livy, which deal, respectively, with tyrannical and republican forms of government.

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of Campanella's thought is found in his view of prophecy. Even though he was governed by anti-Aristotelianism and Telesio's naturalism, he did not finally break with the Roman Catholic church. He criticized Spanish hegemonic policies in Italy and Europe, but never converted to any Protestant communion. He continued to hope for a Catholicism renewed and guided by his religious ideas and, during his French exile, by Gallic political policy. Even before his flight from Italy, moreover, he seems to have hoped for a papal policy influenced by his own ideas. Thus developed Campanella the prophet, as he is found in Ernst's book.

As I suggested above, Ernst's thesis combines his title and the first four chapters' organization with Campanella's life--incarceration, politics, and prophecy. Reading the book requires some previous knowledge of Campanella's philosophy as well as a context into which to place these essays. The fifth chapter is not an essay by Ernst but is rather an appendix containing a short, heretofore unknown work by Campanella, tided Politici e cortigiani contro filosofi e profeti. Ernst discovered it in a Vatican Library codex. Campanella wrote this work in 1627, while he was in the prison of the Holy Office. It offers a meditation on the inevitability of the encounter between politics and prophecy. This little piece is replete with references to events in Campanella's own life. Campanella's combination of his thought with autobiographical elements not only makes this a worthwhile work to include in this book but also justifies Ernst's methodology of combining Campanella's main philosophical ideas with his life as an organizational tool for the entire work. It is a method that overcomes the problem of briefly treating this "too political and too diffuse" philosopher.

EDWARD A. GOSSELIN

California State University 

Long Beach, Emeritus