last, ironic, lesson about exemplarity. Exemplars are rarely the straightforward imitators of past greatness that they claim to be. Rather, in attempting to make the exemplary models of the past relevant to the present, they more often than not create something new. The chain of exemplary causation is as much about innovation as it is about the endless recycling of accomplishment. The greatest exemplars—those who liberate the sparks of the imagination rather than inspiring mere mimicry—are those whose deeds are familiar enough to bring to mind the best of the exemplary tradition, yet who steer the profound authority of that tradition into new channels.
Acknowledgement
The author would like to thank the anonymous reviewers, Alex Christoyannopoulos, Matt Adams, Christina Doonan, and Vivian Kao for helpful feedback, as well as Jeff Stout for his comments on an earlier version of this article.
Notes
1↑ The quote is from Octave Mirbeau. See the “Introduction” to Daniel Guerin, Anarchism: From Theory to Practice (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1970), vii.
2↑ Mel Piehl, Breaking Bread: The Catholic Worker and the Origin of Catholic Radicalism in America (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 1982), x.
3↑ Important examples of this strain of scholarship include Alexander Gelley, ed., Unruly Examples: On the Rhetoric of Exemplarity (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995), Irene E. Harvey, Labyrinths of Exemplarity: At the Limits of Deconstruction (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2002), Bryan R. Warnick, Imitation and Education: A Philosophical Inquiry into Learning by Example (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2008), Dana Hollander, Exemplarity and Chosenness: Rosenzweig and Derrida on the Nation of Philosophy (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2008), Alessandro Ferrara, The Force of the Example: Explorations in the Paradigm of Judgment (New York: Columbia University
