The Hardest 500-1250 Words

It's been another eventful Saturday. I woke up feeling sick as a dog, stayed home from church, watched two movies that were surprisingly good, and started working on my next school assignment--an essay for my Medieval and Early Modern Europe course at York. Thankfully the aching, coughing and pain is starting to go away due to the nasal and sinus relief medicine that I picked up mid-way through the day. While I am grateful my health is returning, this means I have no excuses for not tackling the essay. Compared to other classes, this one is a doozy.

Both Machiavelli's Mandragola and Steven Ozment's collection Magdalena and Balthasar present models of male behaviour in sixteenth-century Europe, though in very different ways. Compare the central figures of Callimaco and Balthasar and answer the following questions: How did Balthasar's life and attitude compare with the sentiment expressed above? [referring to a quote from Machiavelli's play expounding the usual carpe diem attitude] Would Balthasar have appreciated the humour of Mandragola? Would Callimaco have respected or ridiculed Balthasar's way of life? How might you suggest understanding the relationship between a self-conscious cultural artifact like Mandragola and realities of everyday life?

My ideas for the essay are still in the works. All I know is that these men pursue stable economic sources (patrons or trade) as a part of their daily life, self-made men as we call them. Perhaps it is a point when the pursuit of capital intersects with the old system of nobility - when the economy (not rulers) begins to regulate life in Europe, replacing the old lords. The old ideal (nobility; land ownership; Fortune) is juxtaposed/replaced by a new one (entreprenuers; trade/liquid capital; economy)? It's all about the struggle between the old and new way, perhaps? Or am I just being Marxist?

These are my ideas so far.