Don Giovanni 'Viva la libertà'
example · opera: Don Giovanni (Mozart) ·
retold in 4 talks
In the finale of Mozart's Don Giovanni, the protagonist sings 'Since I spend my money freely, I want to be amused', Žižek calls this the most anti-capitalist motto imaginable, because a capitalist never spends money for amusement but always to generate more money.
≤2000talks it is told in, per year2026
As told 3
“Giacché spendo i miei danari, io mi voglio divertir. It is difficult to imagine a more anti-capitalist motto.”
“Viva la libertà, long live freedom.”
“Although the entire group is enthusiastically unified around the call to freedom, each subgroup probably projects into libertà, freedom, its own dreams and hopes.”
What it carries
one story, many jobs: the ideas this anecdote is deployed to argue, one tally mark per use (an idea page shows the same relation from the other end, as its shelf of stories)
Its cast and sources
populated by
Ivan Ilyin2Byung-Chul Han2Rainer Paris1Clara Schumann1Gillian Flynn1Tana French1Albin Kurti1Thomas Hertog1
alongside works
Every retelling 4
In the finale of Mozart's Don Giovanni, the protagonist sings 'Since I spend my money freely, I want to be amused', Žižek calls this the most anti-capitalist motto imaginable, because a capitalist never spends money for amusement but always to generate more money., illustrating sacrificial logic of capitalism,hedonism vs asceticism coincidence
In Mozart's opera, all guests shout 'Long live freedom' but mean different things (peasants vs. nobles); this shared illusion unites them politically despite conceptual confusion., illustrating illusion with real effects,freedom as the freedom to change the rules
~5:01 Slavoj Žižek on Marx, Hegel, Politics, Films, Burgers and Hot Dogs… and a lot more!2021 · 1:47:20
In the finale of Act 1 of Mozart's Don Giovanni, all the guests arrive at a party and start singing 'Viva la libertà!', but each group means something entirely different by freedom., illustrating master signifier,freedom as inconsistent terrain
In Mozart's Don Giovanni, all characters enthusiastically unite in singing 'long live freedom,' but each faction projects its own entirely different meaning into the word., illustrating political universality,empty signifier,freedom as ideology