Pirate Enlightenment, or the Real Libertalia

aw_product_id: 
36593026454
merchant_image_url: 
merchant_category: 
Books
search_price: 
10.99
book_author_name: 
David Graeber
book_type: 
Paperback
publisher: 
Penguin Books Ltd
published_date: 
25/01/2024
isbn: 
9781802061567
Merchant Product Cat path: 
Books > History > Historical events & topics > Social & cultural history
specifications: 
David Graeber|Paperback|Penguin Books Ltd|25/01/2024
Merchant Product Id: 
9781802061567
Book Description: 
'A characteristically radical re-reading of history that places the social and political experiments of pirates at the heart of the European Enlightenment. A brilliant companion volume to the best-selling Dawn of Everything' Amitav GhoshThe Enlightenment did not begin in Europe. Its true origins lie thousands of miles away on the island of Madagascar, in the late seventeenth century, when it was home to several thousand pirates. This was the Golden Age of Piracy - but it was also, argues anthropologist David Graeber, a brief window of radical democracy, as the pirate settlers attempted to apply the egalitarian principles of their ships to a new society on land.In this jewel of a book, Graeber offers a way to 'decolonize the Enlightenment', demonstrating how this mixed community experimented with an alternative vision of human freedom, far from that being formulated in the salons and coffee houses of Europe. Its actors were Malagasy women, philosopher kings and escaped slaves, exploring ideas that were ultimately to be put into practice by Western revolutionary regimes a century later.Pirate Enlightenment playfully dismantles the central myths of the Enlightenment. In their place comes a story about the magic, sea battles, purloined princesses, manhunts, make-believe kingdoms, fraudulent ambassadors, spies, jewel thieves, poisoners and devil worship that lie at the origins of modern freedom.

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