Abstract

On the occasion of his introduction to the new edition of Pocock’s The Machiavellian Moment for the Princeton Classics series, Richard Whatmore began collecting letters and other materials that could provide insights into Pocock’s work, particularly regarding how he came to write The Machiavellian Moment. Whatmore soon realised that few of Pocock’s letters had been retained, either by Pocock himself or by their intended recipients. Quentin Skinner was an exception and came to the rescue, allowing Whatmore to copy letters exchanged between the two men from the 1960s until the publication of The Machiavellian Moment in 1975. The letters raise questions about Pocock’s membership in a so-called Cambridge School, a categorisation that risks presenting a misleading picture of Pocock’s independent approach to a set of issues whose geographical range and chronological extent overflow a simplistic understanding of Cambridge political thought. The following letter from Pocock is a response, written in November 2015, to a set of queries raised earlier in their correspondence by Richard Whatmore. This letter is published with the permission of the Pocock family, and the editor has limited her notes to the identification of persons. Clarificatory information about the location has been added in square brackets..