Book Description
A revelatory new look at how Shakespeare secretly addressed the most profound political issues of his day, and how his plays embody a hidden history of England
In 16th century England many loyal subjects to the crown were asked to make a terrible choice: to follow their monarch or their God. The era was one of unprecedented authoritarianism: England, it seemed, had become a police state, fearful of threats from abroad and plotters at home. This age of terror was also the era of the greatest creative genius the world has ever known: William Shakespeare. How, then, could such a remarkable man born into such violently volatile times apparently make no comment about the state of England in his work? He did. But it was hidden. Revealing Shakespeare's sophisticated version of a forgotten code developed by 16th-century dissidents, Clare Asquith shows how he was both a genius for all time and utterly a creature of his own era: a writer who was supported by dissident Catholic aristocrats, who agonized about the fate of England's spiritual and political life and who used the stage to attack and expose a regime which he believed had seized illegal control of the country he loved. Shakespeare's plays offer an acute insight into the politics and personalities of his era. And Clare Asquith's decoding of them offers answers to several mysteries surrounding Shakespeare's own life, including most notably why he stopped writing while still at the height of his powers. An utterly compelling combination of literary detection and political revelation, Shadowplay is the definitive expose of how Shakespeare lived through and understood the agonies of his time, and what he had to say about them.
Customer Reviews:
Understanding Shakespeare.......2007-07-03
Ms. Asquith has obviously done an enormous amount of research and presents her material in such a way as to keep the reader's attention to the end. I could hardly put this book down. It was truly fascinating.
"Shadowplay" puts a spotlight on the overlooked fact that the Protestant Reformation was not a welcome or peaceful event in English history and unlike other European countries, the English monarchy, driven by Cecil and son, enforced this new religion with violence and persecution turning the country upside down. The average people in the pew were just trying to ride out the storm doing what they could to preserve their lives, faith and their culture until at last this strategy backfired on both the Catholics who remained silent to preserve their lives and living, and even Protestants who thought they'd be on the right side, but who also failed to agree with the Church of England on matters of doctrine.
Enter Shakespeare, whose father's statement of faith was found inside one of the walls of his home and who was raised a Catholic as was everyone else in England before Henry wanted to get rid of his first wife in favor of a younger second (third, fourth, fifth, etc) who might be able to give him the son he demanded. His world was a world of censorship and coersion, but he had a talent that helped him cleverly send messages not only to his fellow Catholics but even to the Queen herself and later King James and sons as well. His words encouraged his fellow Catholics to hold fast to the Faith and provided dramatic reasons for Queen Elizabeth to return to the "fair" Catholic religion or at least to allow all "fair" and "dark" Protestant people to worship freely as their conscience led them. Of especial interest is Sonnet 152 which when read through a political and religious lense means more than just a man railing against his unfaithful lover.
To see Shakespeare's plays through the lense of history is a fascinating journey, and one that would help people to grasp the urgency of the serious, life-or-death messages sent out into a confusing and dark time in European history. It is certainly not your average, boring, politically correct view of Shakespeare. It's better!
In the last days, much is revealed indeed........2007-07-03
In a time when, having recently become Catholic myself, many of my former heroes now seem like dangerous morons and traitors, it is good to know that someone of the stature of Shakespeare was as great as his productions ( Melville and, surprisingly, Edgar Allan Poe also make the cut ).
The evidence is overwhelming that Shakespeare was a closet Catholic, but the good news is that this book robs him of none of his mystery or his humanity. These plays can hardly be reduced to dutiful transcriptions from an orthodox Catholic playbook and reach at a cosmic knowledge that blends Catholic morality and expectation with humanist learning, psychological insight, and also -- most importantly -- a knowledge of the Other Side, the occult, paganism, the devil, witchcraft, incomprehensibly evil natures like those of Shylock and Iago. What seems most Catholic about Shakespeare is his emphasis on the ultimate unreality of these dark forces, their imminent dissipation under the law of Jesus, which results in those troublesome fifth acts like the one in Merchant of Venice where people often complain that things work out too neatly, too perfectly -- well yeah, that's kinda what happens in heaven.
An even more fascinating book could be written on our own Shakespeare, Martin Scorsese, whose fabled career, if you are aware of who runs Hollywood ( hint hint ) is even more miraculous, not only surviving but even wresting an Oscar from the jaws of an atheist and increasingly Satanic propaganda machine that makes Elizabeth's Anglican reign seem comparatively innocent. Most people that still think we live in a free society probably never really comprehended that that Oscar win -- for a movie, The Departed, which is a coded message about the upcoming extermination of Christians -- was perhaps the last gasp of the Catholic faith and a quiet triumph for us to ride out on. For some reason when reading the name "Shakespeare" in this book I couldn't help mistaking it for "Scorsese," so similar are the lives and the talent of these two great men. Maybe that's why he puts that line in the beginning of The Departed, "F--k James Joyce, don't you know any Shakespeare?!"
The Jesuit Mafia invades Greenland.......2007-01-24
Claire Asquith went absent from my GOGGLE search but managed to give me her e-mail adress and some other info i did not need. Already GREENLAND of modern times has begun to draw the ire of the military complex anxiuos to go after Daniel Ortega and the south of the border crowd once more.
Happily the Salam Hayek "boobie bunch" has taken over the Oscar nominations with "Babel".I think we can draw whatever conclusions we want from Shakespeare quotes whose name may be just as made up as Claire's. Shaking his spear is indeed not passive resistance but an obvious retaliation against the crown. Shakespear'es influence once discovered made him a definite candidate for the drawn and quartered contingent which was already a threat to his catholic daughter. The Jesuits have survived many scuffles and have created many martyrs outside the church. Henry Walpole or John Nobody from Asquith's discoveries could indeed be the underground movement of the 1960's of deep throat and the SDS (students for a democratic society,)which is now resurfacing on college campuses..
Mary Ward is yet another google hit which receives a cautious note on its sound byte, surviving also into the 21st century as the Jesuits have.
I was wondering where the tales of Shakespeare in ITALY went. Was he exiled to the "booted" country?
The Passion of The Bard.......2006-12-23
This premise of this book is convincing 1) because of the absolute consistancy of the "code", once recognized, from play to play; 2) the chronological tenor of Shakespeare's themes is shown to accord with the changing contemporary political climate; 3) Shakespeare's poetry is now demonstrated to be a logical "commentary" on his career as playwright.
The one thing I do not want to be true (somewhat akin to hoping against hope that Anastasia "survived") is the pitiful snapshot of Shakespear's last years, "the dark night of the soul" of clinical depression easily diagnosed in the haunting allegorical portrait of his beloved mentor as observed by Ben Jonson in "Sad Shepherd". Alas. Shakespeare may have died after a drinking bout with friend Ben; but the true cause of death seems to have been a broken heart: the despairing Bard regarding the idealistic purpose of his career as playwright as frustrated and utterly futile. He seems now a Catholic martyr, no less than those hanged on Tyburn Tree.
An unxpected bonus of reading this book is 1) a new light on Ben Jonson's work and career 2) the realization that WRT the jingoistic play "Henry VIII" the answer to the ironic question "who wrote Shakespeare? --is the slimey master of pastiche, John Fletcher.
If you liked "Shadowplay" and are interested in the robust flavour of small-town sociology and anthropology of the generation before and the generation after the English Reformation, you will greatly enjoy reading "The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England, 1400-1580" by Cambridge scholar Eamon Duffy, which is vastly more fascinating than its dry title would suggest. It is a masterly example of painstaking revisionist history at its best, and like "Shadowplay" brought tears to my eyes by the last page.
If you love Shakespeare and you are passionate about history. .......2006-06-09
This book is an incredible accomplishment. Clare Asquith has revealed a history of the Protestant reformation in late 16th century England that must have some of the persecuted dead rejoicing from their graves. This is less a book than a revelation. It hardly seems possible that Shakespeares' plays could be even more brilliant and more penetrating then they are already reveared ro be. But that is exactly the case. Mrs. Asquith shows us that with allegory and uncanny symbolism Shakespeare chronicles the history of his country's persecution of Catholics. Written from the vantage point of his own family's persecuted Catholic roots, his plays were a guarded appeal to the Queen herself and the nobility of the day to heal the deep wound suffered when England's faithful became divided.
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Asquith, Clare. Shadowplay; the hidden beliefs and coded politics of William Shakespeare.(Young adult review)(Book review): An article from: Kliatt
Claire Rosser
Manufacturer: Thomson Gale
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Binding: Digital
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ASIN: B000IZJWCY
Release Date: 2006-09-22 |
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This digital document is an article from Kliatt, published by Thomson Gale on September 1, 2006. The length of the article is 436 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Asquith, Clare. Shadowplay; the hidden beliefs and coded politics of William Shakespeare.(Young adult review)(Book review)
Author: Claire Rosser
Publication:
Kliatt (Magazine/Journal)
Date: September 1, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 40
Issue: 5
Page: 38(1)
Article Type: Book review, Young adult review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
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This digital document is an article from Commonweal, published by Thomson Gale on July 15, 2005. The length of the article is 1549 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
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Title: Interesting, if true.(Books)(Shadowplay: The Hidden Beliefs and Coded Politics of William Shakespeare)(Book Review)
Author: Jesse Lander
Publication:
Commonweal (Magazine/Journal)
Date: July 15, 2005
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 132
Issue: 13
Page: 25(2)
Article Type: Book Review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
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This digital document is an article from The Weekly Standard, published by Thomson Gale on July 18, 2005. The length of the article is 1625 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: The Shakespeare plot: England's greatest poet was no Ian Fleming.(Shadowplay: The Hidden Beliefs and Coded Politics of William Shakespeare)(Book Review)
Author: Edwin M., Jr. Yoder
Publication:
The Weekly Standard (Magazine/Journal)
Date: July 18, 2005
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 10
Issue: 41
Page: 35(3)
Article Type: Book Review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
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Shakespiracy theory.(books on William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe)(Book review): An article from: New Criterion
David Propson
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ASIN: B000FIGK60
Release Date: 2006-04-25 |
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This digital document is an article from New Criterion, published by Thomson Gale on February 1, 2006. The length of the article is 3145 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Shakespiracy theory.(books on William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe)(Book review)
Author: David Propson
Publication:
New Criterion (Magazine/Journal)
Date: February 1, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 24
Issue: 6
Page: 23(5)
Article Type: Book review
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This digital document is an article from Christianity and Literature, published by Thomson Gale on June 22, 2006. The length of the article is 11910 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: Was Shakespeare a Christian, and if so, what kind of Christian was he?(Shakespeare the Biography)(Shadowplay: The Hidden Beliefs and Coded Politics of William Shakespeare)(Shakespeare's Second Historical Tetralogy: Some Christian Features)(Spiritual Shakespeares)(Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare)(Shakespeare's Religious Language: A Dictionary)(Shakespeare's Religious Allusiveness: Its Play and Tolerance)(Shakespeare the Papist)(A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare 1599)(Secret Shakespeare: Studies in Theatre, Religion and Resistance)(Book review)
Author: John D. Cox
Publication:
Christianity and Literature (Magazine/Journal)
Date: June 22, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 55
Issue: 4
Page: 539(28)
Article Type: Book review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
Book Description
There's a commonly held view that Douglas Haig was a bone-headed callous butcher, who through his incompetence as commander of the British Army in WWI, killed a generation of young men on the Somme and Passchendaele. On the other hand there are those who view Haig as a man who successfully struggled with appalling difficulties to produce an army which took the lead in defeating Germany in 1918, winning the greatest series of victories in British Military history.
These are therefore the diaries of the most controversial British general of the twentieth century. Just as the success of the Alanbrooke war diaries can be put down to its 'horse's mouth' view of Churchill and the conduct of WWII, so Haig's Diaries, hitherto only previously available in bowdlerized form, give the C-in-C's view of Asquith - he records him getting drunk and incapable - and his successor Lloyd George, of whom he was highly critical as well as his never previously published day by day accounts of the key battles of the war, not least the Somme campaign of 1916.
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Douglas Haig Diaries and Letters 1914-1918
Gary Sheffield , and
John Bourne
Manufacturer: Orion Publishing
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Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 0753820757 |
Book Description
A bad credit rating can keep you from buying a house, renting a car, or even sending flowers. yet most people don't know how to find out the status of their credit or how to fix it if it's bad.This book can save you time and money. Written by a journalist and a credit consultant to the mortgage industry, The Guerrilla Guide to Credit Repair tells you how the major credit bureaus compile your credit history, and teaches you how to deal with them if there is a problem. Easy to use, the book shows you:-How to contact three major credit bureaus and get a copy of your credit report.-How to decipher and understand the report's complex codes, numbers, and implications.-Step-by-step, how to correct errors and clean up your credit history.-How to use your legal rights under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the Fair Billing Act, and the Truth in Lending Act to protect yourself against credit abuse.Sample credit reports, form letters, and proven techniques for credit repair makes this an invaluable guide for all consumers.
Customer Reviews:
Stuff and fluff.......2007-08-22
Save your money. Stuffed with appendices of legislation pertaining to credit industry. Poorly written and worse editing with mispellings and repetition.
Falls short and instills fear of credit bureaus.......2006-07-09
The main idea of this book is that credit reporting is an unfair process to consumers and more legislation is needed to regulate the industry. The authors paint a grim picture of credit agencies and leads you to believe you should be afraid of them. First of all the book is severely outdated. The book falls short due to the amount of mis-information. For example, it convinces readers that anyone that requests their credit report can obtain one; it advises that credit reports are reviewed when a person applies to college and convinces readers that credit reports are so personal that they contain information about a person's grooming habits. LOL - come one, get serious! The book is outdated and at least half of it focuses on trying to teach readers how to manipulate the credit-reporting system to have correct data removed from a credit report. In addition, the book is full of contradictions. It claims that credit reporting is done to punish, even torment consumers and that it's unfair, but a few pages later, the authors state that the intricate system ultimately benefits consumers. Which is it?! It also suggest readers partake in illegal activity in order to obtain a credit report like the ones creditors receive. It tells them to pose as a landlord or employer. This is illegal! Unless you're a deadbeat with low morals, this book is not for you. I'd recommend The Insider's Guide to Credit Repair by K.E. Varner for more useful, practical advice.
This book should be $5.00 - its like a good pamphlet.......2006-02-05
This book was disappointing. Buying a book without being able to browse it beforehand makes it difficult to know if its what you want. If I would have been able to skim through this book prior to buying, I would not have bought it. It's not that it's bad, it's just that its not what I needed or the title implied. It is not a comprehensive book at all. The title "guerrilla" makes you think it will offer unique, aggressive, insightful, strategic, or uncommonly known tactics to attack your credit repair. It absolutely fell short of that. But what it does deliver is very detailed, easy to follow understanding of BASIC information (what credit is, how to contact the bureaus, what type of letters to send, etc.) It gives you a decent strategy on how to dispute items on your CR. A huge shortcoming for this book is that 100 pages of the 200 page book was given to printing the FCRA (fair credit reporting act). Helpful but a waste. Instead of giving us some "guerrilla tactics" for 100 pages, they print the act instead. If you are really trying to repair your credit and you need real life information and real "guerrilla" tactics then you MUST prepare yourself mentally (it can get legal, psychological and emotional) and use the vast amounts of FREE information and FREE resources available online. Try joining FREE online communities/forums. Avoid people capitalizing on your despair with over-priced credit repair books, credit repair kits, pay-for services (i.e. now bankrupt AmeriDebt) or other books where gazillionaires bloviate about how rich and debt-free THEY are. Good for you. People with poor financial situations and poor credit do need inspiration but people also need practical aggressive ways to get their backs from against the wall. In conclusion, you'd be better off researching online for a few weeks, seeking FREE professional opinions, or checking out books like this one from the library.
Sound Advice that Works but...........2005-04-25
Updating would be a good thing with recent changes in the FCRA. I read the reviews by others before I read the material myself. Seeing that other reviewers had looked into Bill Bauer who claimed to be an expert on the topic and gave a very negative review and I saw the book was sound raised my curiousity level and I Googled him as well. I think a new book about him would make fascinating reading. Please do not take the negative reviews seriously. They have an agenda.
what it boils down to.......2005-02-22
I am writing in response to someone who gave this book a bad rec. do to the book not telling him what the cb's use to calc your individual score. The fact is nobody knows. All 3 use their own system and they aint tellin. Besides many creditor will use other data on cb report, not just the score. best you can do is make sure cb info is correct and make all pmts by due dates.
Customer Reviews:
Not a Viable Answer to Neoclassical Orthodoxy.......2007-05-18
In June 2000, several Parisian economics students circulated a petition calling for the reform of their economics curriculum. Their complaint was the inability of the neoclassical economics they were studying to satisfy their need for a deep understanding of the operation of real-life economies. They called for a reform of the university curriculum that would tolerate analytical diversity and foster critical dialogue across contrasting approaches to economics. Their demand was taken up by large numbers of students, and a similar demand was formulated by Ph.D. students at Cambridge University in the UK the next year. This reform movement has grown in Europe, under the rubric of "post-autistic economics." This volume presents their case, but with voices of professional economists rather than students.
The central critique in this edited volume of post-autistic economics papers, repeated by virtually every author, is that neoclassical economics does not describe real-world economies, and must be replaced by or supplemented with other approaches, among which are mentioned Marxism, institutional economics, post-Keynesian economics, and approaches based on Critical Realism. Authors arrive at this result by analyzing the undergraduate university curriculum, with some regard for the introductory graduate economics offering. It is indeed correct that the undergraduate curriculum should be far broader, with less stress on arcane analytical issues in microeconomic theory and greater stress on real-world economic phenomena and performance. The critics are also correct in complaining that attention to a broader variety of economic philosophies would benefit students, especially if offered in the context of the history of economic development and comparative economic systems. Moreover, it is sad that most economic majors are incapable of reading The Economist and have little sophistication in their understanding of economic issues. It is a sad fact that most economics departments support an undergraduate curriculum geared towards the few students who go on to do graduate work, whereas a special track could easily accommodate such students without the need for totally distorting the undergraduate curriculum.
This is much is a critique of pedagogy, not of economic theory. But, the post-autistic economists are just as concerned to present a critique of economic theory on the professional level as well. Unfortunately, they not only do not succeed, but they actually hurt their own cause. They treat standard economic theory as "unrealistic," when in fact, on the professional level, 99% of economists, starting with their Ph.D. dissertations, deal directly with real-world economic issues and problems. Very few young economists take the Walrasian general equilibrium model seriously, or use Representative Agent models in macroeconomics, or use microeconomic price theory except in the most elementary sense. Thus, the post-autistic critique comes off as seeming seriously misdirected.
A more gutsy critique would be to say that neoclassical economics is incorrect, not simply "unrealistic," and to provide alternatives precisely where the theory is incorrect. But, what alternatives? Marxism, Keynesianism, Institutionalism, Syndicalism, Austrian economics, and other non-neoclassical models all developed strongly for a while and then foundered. They certainly do not present analytically interesting alternatives to neoclassical economics. Of course, neoclassical economics is not the only credible starting point for serious economic analysis, but alternatives that are old, warmed-over theories that have not stood the test of time will not succeed in displacing the current orthodoxy. The pleas for democracy, toleration, and pluralism by the "heterodox" is simply an admission that they can't win the intellectual battle by having better theories, only by having more troupes.
Curiously, the authors are unaware of contemporary economic theoretical research, which addresses many of the serious problems with neoclassical theory. There is a short piece on behavioral economics, which has been one of the most vibrant areas in economics over the past 25 years, but the author assumes that behavioral economics is an alternative to neoclassical economics. Rather, it is a complement to economic theory and a source of empirical data that can be used to generate better models. Behavioral economics uses decision theory and game theory to critique the rational actor of traditional economic theory, but the profession is responding by revising the rational actor model, not by rejecting behavioral economics (see recent papers in Econometrica, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, and other journals).
The papers in this book generally present no challenge for the professional economist. Many are just superficial, and some are egregiously incorrect. Perhaps the most bizarre is the paper by Bernard Guerrien, "Can We Expect Anything From Game Theory?" Guerrien asserts, without evidence, that "game theory models are always `stories', like fables or parables, with no relation to real-life situations." Really? What about auction theory, which has been so successful in organizing the sale of bandwidth in many countries? How does one explain the role of game theory in revolutionizing Industrial Organization? Moreover, game theory is the basis for all of behavioral economics, and accounts for its experimental success in large part. Guerrien's description of game theory is quite faulty. "...players are supposed to choose separately and simultaneously one element of their strategy set...", says Guerrien, and launches a broad critique on that basis. But, he is just wrong. Evidently he never heard of extensive form games or behavioral strategies.
Post-autistic economics ignores the innovative work of many innovative, nonstandard, economists, including Ernst Fehr, Abijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, Colin Camerer, Samuel Bowles, George Loewenstein, Daniel Kahneman, Benoit Mandelbrot, Edward Glaeser, David Laibson, Matthew Rabin, Bruno Frey, Elinor Ostrom, Barkley Rosser, Armin Falk, Simon Gaechter, Jean Tirole, Aldo Rustichini, and many others. It ignores neuroeconomics, econophysics, and the notion of the economy as a complex system, with its stress on agent-based modeling. These researchers transform analytical economics to meet the empirical challenges posed by new data. Some of them are extremely critical of neoclassical theory, and others are a bit more tolerant. Some of them call themselves behavioral economists, neuroeconomists, complexity economists, and the like, while others simply say they do economics, without the need to identify with a school of thought. Unlike leaders of the post-autistic school, however, they do not urge a retreat to philosophy or some defunct 20th century doctrine.
good book.......2007-05-15
A Guide to What's Wrong with Economics covers several papers on the problems about neo classical economics.
Reasonable discussion of neoclassical economics.......2006-11-17
Fullbrook's collection of critical papers titled "What's Wrong With Economics", with contributions from twenty-six different authors on seven core subjects, is a reasonable introduction to heterodox economics for the layman with an interest in the 'technical' aspects of economics. Practically all the essays in this book are written from a radical neoclassical perspective criticizing the mainstream, although the writers vary much in the degree of their radicalism. Some authors just call for more attention to local circumstances or the environment, others, such as Steve Keen, Geoffrey Hodgson and Bernard Guerrien seek to demolish certain fundaments of the neoclassical mainstream.
None of the papers, perhaps with the exception of Keen's, are very difficult to read, and most are short and to the point, which is very pleasant. The quality is varying, with some papers making rather weak points that could be avoided with just minor surface changes of mainstream practice or that attack precisely things that are not the issue of neoclassical economics, such as with Anne Mayhew's contribution. Generally though the essays are reasonably interesting and informative, and because of the excellent scope of this book, a balance between width and depth is achieved that allows any intelligent reader to get a primer on what is, indeed, wrong with economics. The only major flaw is that it contains no criticisms other than radical neoclassical; there's no neo-Ricardian or Marxist in sight.
Good subject matter, but needs to be tied together more tightly.......2005-09-12
This book is a useful and quick read for those interested in why academic economics sometimes seems to make so little sense. It is not about what is wrong with economics, it is more about what is wrong with neoclassical economics. However, in the public's mind and in most economics department neoclassical economics is economics. Unfortunately, the monopoly position of neoclassical economics leaves many students bewildered, especially those who are at least somewhat familiar with the ideas of the 19th century political economists.
The book is a collection of essays by a wide variety of economists, many with heterodox views.
The essays vary wildly in style, relevance, and value, but reading the book is justified not by the analytical excellence of every single essay, but by the few stand out essays which will allow the reader to pursue interesting strands of heterodox thought. In particular I found the essay by Steven Keen to be particularly worthwile. After reading it I decided to immediately buy his book "Debunking Economics."
It is vitally important that those studying economics have at least a passing familiarity with heterodox views, whether or not they agree with them. What heterodoxy provides is a better way of understanding, critiquing, and ultimately expanding and strengthening the current paradigm in economics. In other words, even the staunchest neoclassical economist will gain from reading this book because it will challenge one to think more critically about underlying assumptions. Of course, there is the possibility, ever so remote, that one strand of heterodox thought may succeed in overthrowing the dominant paradigm and become the new king of the hill in economic thought.
Is the economics news trustworthy?.......2005-07-09
This is an insightful and very important book. Its focus is the underlying assumptions that dominate economics in the news, political debate, and the academy. The writing is largely accessible to the intelligent lay person. (One does not need to be a mathematician.) The authors put the current consensus, neoclassical economics, to the test of the real world. It doesn't do well, and they point to a better way. (For a sort of preview of this book, see "Let there be markets," by Gordon Bigelow, in the May '05 _Harper's_.) After reading _A Guide_, you'll undoubtedly have some new questions about, for example, the next report that GDP ("the economy") is growing. If this volume whets your appetite, see _The Wealth of Nature_ (2003), by Robert L. Nadeau. (Note: Nadeau's book is less lay reader-friendly, though it too does not require a mathematician.).
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This digital document is an article from Journal of Economic Issues, published by Thomson Gale on September 1, 2006. The length of the article is 877 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.
Citation Details
Title: A Guide to What's Wrong with Economics.(Book review)
Author: Charles G. Leathers
Publication:
Journal of Economic Issues (Magazine/Journal)
Date: September 1, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 40
Issue: 3
Page: 841(3)
Article Type: Book review
Distributed by Thomson Gale
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Harm Less Lawsuits?: What's Wrong with Consumer Class Actions (Aei Liability Studies)
Michael S. Greve
Manufacturer: AEI Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
Consumer Law
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ASIN: 0844742155 |
Book Description
This monograph describes the origins of consumer class actions and analyzes their theoretical and practical problems.
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Crows Do Not Have Retirement: Poems
Dale Zieroth , and
David Zieroth
Manufacturer: Harbour Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
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ASIN: 1550172506 |
Book Description
Crows Do Not Have Retirement, David Zieroth's sixth book of poems, explores the many lives of the spirit and the flesh: lives that challenge, bewilder and excite. With the fluidity of language and sharpness of image that he is known for, Zieroth voyages through the conflicting worlds of dream and everyday life, exploring feelings of extreme self-irony, honesty, jubilation and terror.
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