IRL Machiavellian plotting

[Corpsey]

Have you ever done it? Or had it done to you?

Whenever I read Othello (every night before bed while doing crunches hanging from a pullup bar) I think about how satisfying it would be to manipulate your enemies and see them descend into madness and murder.

But I'm too lazy, anxious and moral (or is morality just another form of anxiety?) to do it. Perhaps I just lack the motive. (And the enemies.)

I suspect nobody will have done it here cos we're not psychopaths.

 

[Corpsey]

Hmm totally wrong forum for this but

Maybe ppl can suggest the best films/books/plays about this subject.

Demonic string pullers. (And angelic ones?)

 

[Corpsey]

Just imagine having a plan in mind concerning someone you know. Totally alien to me.

 

[linebaugh]

@suspended

 

[Corpsey]

@craner

 

[WashYourHands]

Let me introduce you to some opiate addicts @Corpsey if you want epic Machiavellian undoing of friends, family or anyone with a spare few quid

Iago was never clucking to score

Uncle Jr from The Sopranos perhaps, never had the makings of a varsity athlete etc

 

[version]

The Dudley - Exley duel across Ellroy's L.A. quartet is a great battle between two string pullers.

 

[linebaugh]

its not really a subgenre at the moment is it? what made it so popular in the past?

 

[martin]

Maybe ppl can suggest the best films/books/plays about this subject.

Pop 1280 and The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson are good for this. Actually, most Jim Thompson.

 

[Corpsey]

I read the Killer Inside Me but I can't remember anything about it. Other than him being a psychopath who beats up (and murders?) women.

 

[Corpsey]

Iago was never clucking to score

Apart from with Desdemona, perhaps.

The biggest Machiavellian in The Sopranos, early on at least was Tony's mother.

 

[Corpsey]

It obviously really helps in drama to have characters thinking like this, in terms of trying to manipulate each other, take each other down etc. Cos in life (my life at least) most of the time there's really no planning going on at all, you're just bumping into things. There's no goal beyond doing as little work as possible.

 

[Leo]

A key story line in Better Call Saul, Jimmy and Kim plotting against Howard Hamlin. Until the most recent episode, anyway.

 

[woops]

A key story line in Better Call Saul, Jimmy and Kim plotting against Howard Hamlin. Until the most recent episode, anyway.

Funny you mention this cos I was just thinking about his brothers ability to guess every step of his cunning plan.

 

[IdleRich]

Sunset Beach was filled with this.

 

[WashYourHands]

Apart from with Desdemona, perhaps.

The biggest Machiavellian in The Sopranos, early on at least was Tony's mother.

 

[yyaldrin]

when version did that craner is an awful man tag was that machiavellian?

 

[sus]

Hmm totally wrong forum for this but

Maybe ppl can suggest the best films/books/plays about this subject.

Demonic string pullers. (And angelic ones?)

Basic Instinct is the obvious choice. House of Games is the correct one.

 

[sus]

This talk is quite good TBH, and I think provides the context (Christian moralism!) against which Machiavelli's view of the human strategic situation (sometimes it's best to lie! sometimes it's best to shirk promises!) became so disreputable & sinister.

 

[luka]

i think wyndham lewis lion and the fox was interesting but actually i cant remember anything about it