Discourse on Voluntary Servitude Étienne de La Boétie 1549

soupy · Post by **soupy** » January 12th, 2017, 11:55 am

Étienne de La Boétie asks one of the most basic questions of political theory: why is it that a minority of rulers can remain in power over a majority of subjects who pay all the taxes. His answer is that most of the subjects willingly submit to rule by a minority.

Boétie was Montaigne's good friend.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89tienne_de_La_Bo%C3%A9tie

Discourse on Voluntary Servitude (1549, first published in 1576)

http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/boetie-the-discourse-of-voluntary-servitude

Post by **annise** » January 12th, 2017, 1:48 pm

It's the translation date that affects the abilty of us to use it - the 1549 date is irrelevant unless you are suggesting reading it in the original language, so you need a source we can accept

Anne

soupy · Post by **soupy** » January 12th, 2017, 2:40 pm

Ok. I couldn't find an English translation earlier than that.

Craig

bennow · Post by **bennow** » January 15th, 2017, 9:34 am

I've always hoped to read this text for LV. I'm curious about the pd status of this, given that it appears Columbia Univ press never renewed the copyright. Not only at the link in this thread, but also at Hathitrust and Constitution Society site it is listed as out of copyright and pd. I haven't brought it up before because I know this is super gray-area stuff, but I'd really like to read it. Any way we can evaluate these other sources?

https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001139922

http://www.constitution.org/la_boetie/serv_vol.htm

bennow · Post by **bennow** » January 15th, 2017, 9:47 am

fwiw, it's also here at wikisource:

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Discourse_on_Voluntary_Servitude

Post by **TriciaG** » January 15th, 2017, 11:02 am

We don't trust Wikisource.

We DO trust Hathi Trust. So that could be used as a text source.

bennow · Post by **bennow** » January 15th, 2017, 11:08 am

Alright! Thanks so much for that Tricia!

Craig - if you had it in mind to read yourself, I certainly won't swoop for it. But if you intended to put it out there for someone else to read, I'm your man...

soupy · Post by **soupy** » January 15th, 2017, 11:47 am

I just put it out there as a suggestion. It's all yours bennow

Craig

bennow · Post by **bennow** » January 19th, 2017, 7:24 am

Awesome! I'm going to get on it asap.

Thanks so much for lighting the fire! I think this is incredibly timely, for obvious reasons.

soupy · Post by **soupy** » January 19th, 2017, 9:30 am

I think this is incredibly timely, for obvious reasons.

Good luck with the project. I agree with the above.

Craig