3.5
Five Moral Pieces
ByPublisher Description
In a deeply personal essay, Eco recalls his boyhood experience of Italy's liberation from fascism. He then analyzes the universal elements of fascism, including the "cult of tradition" and a "suspicion of intellectual life." And finally, in an open letter to an Italian cardinal, Eco reflects on a question underlying all the reflections in the book: What does it mean to be moral or ethical when one doesn't believe in God?
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Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communitiesFive Moral Pieces Reviews
3.5
“A great, brief selection of Eco's essay. The best of them is "UR-Fascism," which begins as a reflection on growing up in Italy under Mussolini's reign and ends as a reflection on the definition of fascism. These are, for the most part, and as that brief description would lead you to believe, serious reflections, but Eco has a lightness of touch which keeps it from being a morose or pessimistic. I found "On the Press" the least interesting of these, though it is of historical interest and is of interest in that quite a few of its predictions about the future of mass media have come to pass. It's also the outlier in terms of topic, as the others hang more tightly around war, intolerance, and the like. <br/><br/>Eco was prolific, in both fiction and non-fiction. Next up for me will likely be his [b:The Limits of Interpretation|23070|The Limits of Interpretation (Advances in Semiotics)|Umberto Eco|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1383166577l/23070._SX50_.jpg|2670185] or [b:Interpretation & Overinterpretation|10516|Interpretation & Overinterpretation (Tanner Lectures in Human Values)|Umberto Eco|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348363997l/10516._SY75_.jpg|2137565] (which also contains essays by [a:Richard Rorty|100476|Richard Rorty|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1238797436p2/100476.jpg], [a:Jonathan Culler|38397143|Jonathan Culler|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png], and [a:Christine Brooke-Rose|121967|Christine Brooke-Rose|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1367594433p2/121967.jpg]). But I also have [b:The Name of the Rose|119073|The Name of the Rose|Umberto Eco|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1415375471l/119073._SY75_.jpg|3138328] on hold. It's one of those I've started a few times and always intended to finish one day.”
“The First three essays had a very specific context related to contemporary Italian society but the last two essays on Fascism and Intolerance vis a vis Migration were more comprehensible as they were much more relatable, sharing a proximity to the times we live in. No doubt that Umberto Eco writes with a certain flair and wit.”
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