Status
Available
Publication
New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1997.
Description
Money is now so pervasive that few people question it, but Buchan argues that money has brought the world to a condition of unprecedented instability and shows how it has colonised the world both as a physical entity and as an idea of happiness.
User reviews
LibraryThing member Quickpint
Not much short of a masterpiece, although a fairly modest book in its ambition. Its triumph - apart from in its erudition and style - is in its conception. Uniquely, as far as I am aware, this book attempts a cultural definition of money, and shatters the pretension of economics as a science.
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Utterly convincing and compelling in equal measure. It is not without out the odd flaw (a dodgy assertion, a specious argument, an unflattering revelation about its author) but I have already read it twice and doubtless will read it again. Over the years I have bought extra copies to foist on friends and colleagues. For the casual browser on LibraryThing, all I can say as an online stranger is that I urge you to read this book - moreso than any other I have read. Show Less
LibraryThing member questbird
An excellent historical-philosophical-literary look at the growing power of money in our world, and a plea for sanity. "Humanity itself is transforming into the dragon of the Nibelungen, squatting in a filthy cave amid heaps of dusty treasure." (Interestingly, I found this book reduced to $2, as
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further evidence of the disengagement of price and value). Show Less
Subjects
Awards
Pol Roger Duff Cooper Prize (Winner — 1997)
501 Must-Read Books (Emma Beare, 2006) (History)