Hubris is a notion that has recently acquired special urgency, as it seems to express in the post-communist era the demands of justice during the tragic clash between governance and violence. This ethico-political notion deserves to be studied not only in ancient writings but in modern drama and thought as well. Nikos Kazantzakis' unduly neglected Capodistria (1944) dramatizes the dilemmas of civic action during the democratic constitution of a polity. A reading of this tragedy from the perspective of political theory (...) suggests ways in which the meaning of hubris in modernity may be better understood. (shrink)