Ressenyes

Abstract

This book was translated into Spanish and French in 2015, which is indicative of its relevance. A thorough review of the bibliography was conducted during the edition of the Spanish version, which also features a new set of examples of the political manipulation of the medieval legacy and its interpretation. The titles of both the Spanish and the French version do not convey the exact meaning of the original Italian title—medioevo militante—and it has been changed to el presente medieval and médiéval et militant respectively. The book retains its interest, but there is, however, no justification for that change. The key to its success lies in the masterly exposition of how the postmedieval reconstruction of the Middle Ages, understood both chronologically and philosophically—namely the denial of modernity and the affirmation of the futility of the notion of progress—is rooted in a process of nineteenth-century, bourgeois, and Romantic origins. This reconstruction is capitalized on in order to build legitimizing political discourses, whose influence and convening power are felt from the radical Left to neo-Nazism—just to mention the two most stridently radical cases—and are applied not only to the process of European unification but also to the war against terrorism.