Original scientific paper

https://doi.org/10.21464/fi39203

Physical Exercise and Game-Playing in the Four Constructions of Happy Human Life. Thomas More, Franciscus Patricius, Tommaso Campanella and Bernard Herbert Suits

Matija Mato Škerbić orcid.org/0000-0003-0006-4533 ; Sveučilište u Zagrebu, Fakultet hrvatskih studija, Borongajska cesta 83d, HR–10000 Zagreb

Abstract

The paper was prompted by B. H. Suitsʼ construction of Utopia and solutions for the meaningful and happy life of every single human, presented in The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia (1978). The author considers, critically evaluates and confronts the role of human physical exercise and game-playing in four constructions of meaningful and happy human life, presented in three Renaissance philosophical writings: De optimo reipublicae statu deque nova insula Utopia libelous (1516) by T. More, La città felice (1553) by F. Patricius, and Civitas Solis. Idea reipublicae philosophicae (1603) by T. Campanella, with the aforementioned B. H. Suitsʼ postmodern writing. The authorʼs thesis is that Suitsʼ solution to human meaningful and full life, which consists in constant game-playing or engaging in only autotelic and intrinsically valuable activities, contains all the leisured intentions of other considered constructions. Moreover, although Suits aims at contemporary humans, it is a solution for all historical periods, conditions or circumstances.

Keywords

physical exercise; game; play; game­playing; Bernard Herbert Suits; Thomas More; Utopia; Franciscus Patricius; La Città Felice; Tommaso Campanella; Civitas Solis

Hrčak ID:

236956

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/236956

Publication date:

17.8.2019.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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