Introduction

The chapter argues that we have witnessed a progressive fragmentation of Hobbes's studies in the twentieth century. A number of external and internal causes may have contributed to the gradual disappearance of epic interpretations of Hobbes's system of ideas. Among internal causes, some interpreters have singled out contextualism, analytical philosophy and game theory as the driving forces that led readers to disregard the whole of Hobbes's philosophy. In 1886, G. C. Robertson argued that Hobbes's political views were, in fact, derived from 'his personal circumstances and the events of his time'. On the one hand, this claim had profound effects on Hobbesian scholarship in that it put in question the bearing of Hobbes's cosmology and theory of motion on his political thought. The Hobbes's political and natural philosophy seems to represent an interesting and yet largely irrelevant background. This phenomenon was noticed and lamented by a number of Hobbesian scholars in the 1980s.