Leonhard Emmerling, "The Idiots: The History of the Homo Nullus" (Seagull Books, 2026)
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What is the origin and core concept of the “idiot” figure in Emmerling’s book?
Welcome to the New Books Network. Hello everyone. Welcome back to New Books Network. This is your host, Morteza Hajizadev. Today I'm honored to be speaking with Dr. Leonard Emmerling about his most recent book. Uh, Dr. Leonard Leonard Emmerling is an art historian who has directed cultural institutions across Germany and New Zealand. And his new book is called Um Idiots, uh, The History of Home and Knowledge, which does something quite uh spectacular. I haven't seen a book that does such a thing in uh quite this way. It takes the word that we throw around as an insult and asks, uh, what if um the idiot is actually one of the most important figures in Western um culture? Emerin uh uh traces uh they did it all the way back to ancient Greece.
Someone was cut off from public life through medieval, holy fools, into Dostoyevsky, Nietzsche, and also to the artists and punks of the twentieth century. Uh the book has been published by uh Chicago University Press just a few months ago. Uh Leonard, well Leonard, welcome to New Books Network. Thanks for the invitation. Before we start talking about the book, can you just very briefly introduce yourself and tell us how the idea of the book came to you? And I'm particularly interested in the scope of the book because you cover something around 2500 years of history from ancient Athens to today's uh newspaper headlines. Um, and you trace the word um idiot across all those years.
How does Emmerling trace the ancient Greek roots of the idiotes to medieval holy fools?
Tell us a little bit about the inception of this book.
Okay, maybe
first about my
Myself, so I'm I'm I'm an artist during. I studied artistry in Germany and uh wrote my PhD about the art theory of Jean Dubiffy, the painter and collector and writer. And uh used to work as a curator in Germany and UCL before I joined the Bird Institute as a head of visual arts. Arts in Munich and then at different different positions in New Delhi, Chicago, and now in Geneva. Um the Book itself is probably a book about um okay, it's about inspiration, which might a little bit uh surprising because uh when uh when you think of the title, but it started with a with a with a remark by uh Chant Dubuffet in his writings about the uh La Force Maïotique du Néon. That's what it's So the the the productive power of nothingness
And I always wondered what what he actually meant with that until I stumbled across the writings of uh Nikolaus de Kus, uh medieval philosopher and uh theologist who wrote in 1450 two uh published two books uh idiota del menite and um uh idiota uh as the two books about the idiots the the the layman and there was uh there was a the story of the spoon carver So the spooncalver sits at the gate of a city and uh claims that he can create something out of nothing. He doesn't need to know anything, he doesn't meet the libraries, he doesn't meet the the teaching of his ancestors, he has um access to what he called infinite. knowledge, which is nothing else but having access to the to the knowledge of God directly, without any intermediary.
And all of a sudden these two two two s the story collapsed with that remark by Dubuffy, and I had the idea of oh well that that's the story of the idiota or the idiot, the guy who knows nothing but creates something out of nothing and uh starts uh creating his own world or her own world. And that's of course also the story of of the abrupt artist who's in Dubuffy's perspective creates art without any predecessor, without making making any reference to anything in in the history of art or uh in the in the what what we know about the history of art. Yeah.
So this is why the the subtitle, the homo nullus, kind of plays on on two levels. It's on one hand, yeah, it's uh what what medical uh literature, uh how medical literature of the nineteenth century described uh the cutter or the idiot or the imbecile. It's it's an homo nullus. But it's also the uh uh the level of nothingness from which something uh can emerge or something that can be
Created. And and um I and you're right. When I when I read the book, I I sort of kind of expected to hear all uh negative things about um idiots, the history of all idiots, but your book quite changed my perspective.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the origin and core concept of the “idiot” figure in Emmerling’s book?
0:01–1:34
2
How does Emmerling trace the ancient Greek roots of the idiotes to medieval holy fools?
1:34–10:01
3
Why do Saint Paul, Saint Francis and other religious figures claim idiocy as a spiritual advantage?
10:01–17:46
4
How have artists from Dada to Warhol used the idiot as a subversive creative force?
17:46–28:56
5
What is the link between the historical idiot and contemporary political leaders?
28:56–39:25
6
Which modern politicians exemplify the “idiot” archetype and why?
39:25–49:38
7
Can the contemporary rise of the idiot be displaced by new cultural trends?
49:38–54:53
8
What are the key take‑aways and future implications of Emmerling’s analysis?
54:53–55:56