Book excerpt: Massimo Cacciari is one of the leading public intellectuals in today's Italy. This collection of essays on political topics provides the best introduction in English to his thought to date.This carefully curated collection includes chapters on Hofmannsthal, Luk\ cs, Benjamin, Nietzsche, Weber, Derrida, Schmitt, Canetti, and Aeschylus. Written between 1978 and 2006, these essays engagingly address the most hidden tradition in European political thought: the unpolitical. Far from being a refusal of politics, The Unpolitical represents a merciless critique of political reason and a way out of the now impracticable consolations of utopia and harmonious community.A lucid and engaging Introduction by Alessandro Carrera sets these essays in the context of Cacciari's work generally and in the broadest context of its historical and geographical backdrop.