Preface

Summary

This book has been long in the making. My first article on Bauer, in 1989, depicted him as a radical subjectivist. I returned to the subject in 1992, when I located Bauer's prize manuscript on Kant in the archives of the Humboldt-Universität, Berlin. This text convinced me to revise my thinking on Bauer completely. I began a draft of the present manuscript during a sabbatical in 1995, at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, where I benefited greatly from discussions with Claudio Cesa. A colloquium on the 150th anniversary of the Revolutions of 1848 sponsored by the University of Ottawa, then celebrating its own sesquicentennial, was an occasion to reflect on the heritage of Left-Hegelian thought and to clarify the issues that divided republicans and socialists. My Visiting Fellowship at Clare Hall, Cambridge, provided me with a hospitable and stimulating environment in which, finally, to complete the work.

To the President and Fellows of Clare Hall, to Claudio Cesa, H. S. Harris, Gareth Stedman Jones, and Lawrence Stepelevich, who offered advice and encouragement, to Andrew Chitty and Joseph McCarney, for their insightful criticisms, I extend my sincere thanks. Quentin Skinner's work convinced me that Bauer's critique of the Restoration state and religion, of liberalism, and of socialism could best be integrated in a republican frame; I am grateful to him for our conversations in Cambridge on republicanism and aesthetics. Robert Pippin and two anonymous reviewers for Cambridge University Press provided valuable comments on the manuscript.