Reviews for History of the Portuguese Fado

The average rating for History of the Portuguese Fado based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2016-10-08 00:00:00 Julie A. Kaifesh At this point, Pocock's argument is old news, but that doesn't change the fact that it's still very big news. This was a tremendous (and tremendously careful) study of how the English approach to common law in the early 17th century (as by, say, Edward Coke) led to the development of the notion of its "timelessness" as part of an "ancient" (and, as Janelle Greenberg and others have discussed, largely fictional) constitution that was later subverted by more radical authors during the turbulent mid-17th century (and belatedly incorporated by apologists for the Crown). This differed from developments elsewhere on the continent, where regular exposure to civil law systems led to critiques of royal authority by Hotman et al. that were quite distinct than those authored across the Channel (not that England lacked ecclesiastical courts, or that they were unaware of this tradition--as Pocock notes, English legal thinkers referenced civil law in the mid-16th century, and Coke's work, although "historical," was nonetheless sui generis). Pocock would elaborate the "method" employed in doing this sort of history in subsequent writings, but this remains the most representative (if not necessarily the best) work in this genre. As a side note: I had dinner with this very old man two weeks ago, and am pleased to report that he's about as gracious and witty a person as one could imagine.

Review # 2 was written on 2013-08-05 00:00:00 Sage Hanna It's taken me nearly a year to get through this in its entirety, having originally read the first couple chapters for a paper I was writing on Edward Coke, and then setting it down for some months. But now that I have returned to it, this is a most stunning and comprehensive work. Pocock's narrative explains the common law mindset based around the ancient constitution--the body of customary law established from time immemorial--and its genealogy through Coke and Hale (and up to Burke); its foe in positive law laid down by the Hobbesian sovereign, whether by a sovereign parliament or absolute monarch, based in debates over whether William was conqueror or English law had its origins in German law; and its ultimate death-by-salvation in the timelessness of Locke's Whig social contract. The book is incredibly dense and presupposes a depth of knowledge which I have, in two years of legal and historical study, only begun to scratch the surface--but the amount that it explains and elucidates about the emergence of our modern politics from the late-Medieval mindset is simply astounding and worth every moment spent.