Theory of the Leisure Class. Veblen, 1899.

Thorstein Veblen. THE THEORY OF THE LEISURE CLASS. An Economic Study in the Evolution of Institutions. Macmillan, NY, 1899.

Current Selling Prices
$2500-$5000 /£1200-£2500

ECONOMICS / SOCIOLOGY
A 'sexy' economics book, or at least it was. I 'accidentally discovered' a copy of this in the late 1990s at a high end West Coast bookshop for $100 and I got about £1200 for it. Sadly this doesn't happen every day. At the time it was a 'sleeper' and there were no copies on the net - the dealer had priced it from an auction record of $90; it had however appeared in Quaritch catalogues and economics was, at the time, le dernier cri. It is a regular size octavo in dark green vertical grain cloth lettered gilt at the spine. It doesn't look expensive or rare or important.

Although he produced nine books between 1899 and 1923, Veblen's academic fortunes did not prosper. Veblen (pictured above) had taught at Stanford and in fact they forced him out in 1911; after a somewhat rackety career he died in a shack in woody Menlo Park in 1929. In the iconoclastic 'Leisure Class' he had applied Darwin's evolutionary theories to the study of modern economic life, highlighting the competitive and predatory nature of the business world. With great humour he identified the markers of American social class, and he coined the term "conspicuous consumption" to describe their displays of wealth. A number of Veblen's other basic concepts and insights have become widely accepted in American socio - economic analysis: these include the 'sense of workmanship' 'culture lag' and 'conspicuous waste.' He also said: 'All business sagacity reduces itself in the last analysis to judicious use of sabotage...' the kind of thing Adam Smith might have said if he was less of a gent. Prophetically, Veblen warned specifically against the belief that the engineers are capable of taking over and running the system...

I was reminded of Veblen the other night watching John Travolta being interviewed by Jonathan Ross (not shy himself in material display). Travolta talked modestly of his personal Boeing 707, his 40 strong entourage and his 3 permanent pilots who live nearby his foolishly large house with its own runway and a second jet (possibly a mere Gulfstream.) Veblen had noted that wealth was most conspicuously displayed in a person's middle years. There is a book about the art collector Charles Saatchi ('SuperCollector' by Hatton and Walker / Artology) written along Veblenian lines showing how contemporary art is a perfect vehicle for the display of wealth and how it also also trumps other peoples wealth with its implication of taste and sophistication. Some wag once said that 'collecting modern art is a rich man's way of making poor people feel stupid.'



VALUE? It has made as much as $2800 at auction. It seldom shows up in limpid condition. Heritage, who have a predilection for the book (possibly it resonates in L.A.) have a superior 'fine, fresh' copy at $6000 and apart from a signed copy (which I have never heard of) it cannot get higher than that. Lesser copies are available at between $3000 and $4000. It is not madly scarce and the show may have rolled on in terms of desirability but it is still a wonderful book to find overlooked somewhere. The whole text can be downloaded at Gutenberg Project, reprints are available for a few dollars more but nothing beats owning the book - one of the great titles.

STOP PRESS. I was prompted to revisit this masterpiece when I stumbled upon some pictures of Travolta's house-cum-airport, a stunning demonstration of conspicuous consumption. It was at Testar Logistics. Also I came across this piece about the book in Max Lerner's 'Ideas are Weapons':-

"Into it he poured all the acidulous ideas and fantastic terminology that had been simmering in his mind for years. It was a savage attack upon the business class and their pecuniary values, half concealed behind an elaborate screenwork of irony, mystification and polysyllabic learning"

Currently there are 2 firsts on the web, a modest condition copy at £2500 and a lousy copy at £1300. I always feel that ugly and shabby examples of books should be priced at about a 10th of a very good copy but condition seems to have gone out of the window on the web and 50% or even 75% of decent seems to be the norm. However much you loved the sage of the Stanford woods would you want to pay over a grand sterling for a copy described thus? - "A few library marks, insert removed from rear endpaper. First 2 leaves barely attached. Front inner hinge tender. Green cloth fraying at tips, scuffed. Scattered, light pencil marks mostly to margins. Light spotting to endpapers. Ex-Library." A self respecting French dealer would bin it. The book seems even in these troubled times to be somewhat on the rise, all the copies mentioned above have sold since September 07. The late unlamented Heritage may have taken their copy home, none have been seen in the rooms for 3 years. A limpid copy or a signed one should easily double the prices up top.

Wiped Out: How I Lost A Fortune In The Stock Market...

WIPED OUT: How I Lost A Fortune In The Stock Market While The Averages Were Making New Highs, By An Anonymous Investor. Simon & Schuster, N.Y. 1966.

Current Selling Prices
$80-$1100 /£40-£550

STOCK MARKET / ECONOMICS
The first truly anonymous book I have done--the author is unknown. Certainly not Warren Buffett. One of those 'don't do what I have done' books- the 'totally galvanizing' confession of an amateur investor who at first made money in the stock market and then tried to make more money faster.. .

A great ebay favourite where it has made a few notable prices and is featured at the excellent and exhaustive list a book that looks like nothing at the Ebay Forums. Possibly 'netblown' - you now see copies all over the web -one virtual antique shop has it at an unashamed $700. I suspect that after a few spectacular results at Ebay many people dug out copies and supply and demand took over and the wave broke. It is not entirely ruined yet and there is a growing number of collectors for stock market related books. A collection was recently offered for over a million dollars by Shapero in London and not all stock market books are about fortunes made--there was a spate of books about the crash of 1929 and Black Thursday - Tennyson's 'Maud' is said to be about the suicide of someone who lost all his money in the markets:

'Did he fling himself down? who knows? for a vast speculation had fail’d,
And ever he mutter’d and madden’d, and ever wann’d with despair,
And out he walk’d when the wind like a broken worlding wail’d,
And the flying gold of the ruin’d woodlands drove thro’ the air. ..'

Failure is always fascinating. I shall be dealing with the Failiure (sic) Press this week-an obscure journal to which Stephen Fry was wont to contribute in the late 1970s. 'Wiped Out' for some reason comes in various different coloured d/ws -- no precedence has been established...no one has yet bothered. This is usually done with dated presentations and I have never heard of a signed copy. Can an anonymous person sign a book?

VALUE? Copies seen as high as $1100 (for a proof copy, but a frankly demented and buffoon price). A fine copy can be had for around a $100, half that for one with shelf wear--this is not 'Wealth of Nations!' [ W/Q ** ]

Adam Smith. The Wealth of Nations 1776.

"...by directing (his) industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good. It is an affectation, indeed, not very common among merchants, and very few words need be employed in dissuading them from it..."

Adam Smith. AN INQUIRY INTO THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF THE WEALTH OF NATIONS. London, for W. Strahan and T. Cadell, 1776.

Current Selling Prices
$90000-$15000 /£45000-£75000

ECONOMICS
A wonderful title. A landmark work by the prophet of the free market. The Victorian philosopher Henry Thomas Buckle once claimed that, in its effect, this was "probably the most important book that has ever been written" and that "that this solitary Scotchman has, by the publication of one single work, contributed more toward the happiness of man than has been effected by the united abilities of all the statesmen and legislators of whom history has presented an authentic record." On the other hand Dr Johnson told Boswell that Smith "was as dull a dog as he had ever met with" --Boswell had been one of Smith's pupils at Glasgow University.

The book, two sound quartos, sold well, and the first edition, the number of which is unknown, sold out within six months. This came as a surprise to the publisher, and probably also to Smith himself - in a letter to David Hume he wrote that the book 'requires much thought and reflection (qualities that do not abound among modern readers) to peruse to any purpose."

Probably one of the least asleep of all books--you are most unlikely to find one cheap--if you find a 1776 edition, and they do turn up, it will almost always be the 3 volume Dublin printing worth about a tenth of the London edition. The above quotation about the 'invisible hand' gives an idea of the style and thrust of the book. It is much loved by enlightened Republicans, libertarians and high Tories. Bagehot was a fan. Reaganomics was nothing but Adam Smith. The amusing P.J. O'Rourke has produced a sort of 'Adam Smith for Dummies' called 'P.J. O’Rourke on The Wealth of Nations" a good summary and explication in which he also takes a few swipes at liberals (however the man, described on one site as 'an ageing bong head', is no Rush Limbaugh.) He sees Enron as an example of businessmen not following Smith's principles - self-interest and greed being antithetical to each other. Greed is not good business.

The book is featured in 'Printing and the Mind of Man'- a work that used to be a bible among serious collectors of landmark books. It is still important, but you don't hear people say 'it's in PMM!' so much anymore. PMM says of the book:

'Where the political aspects of human rights had taken two centuries to explore, Smith’s achievement was to bring the study of economic aspects to the same point in a single work … The certainty of its criticism and its grasp of human nature have made it the first and greatest classic of modern economic thought...’

VALUE? A copy made £85000 (+ commission taking in to little short of £100,000 to get it out of the room) in June this year. It was in an Edwards of Halifax binding (decorated / painted at the spine with a family crest.) There is a bit of a fetish for such bindings so this may have fired this price up, a copy in a handsome binding sits in London at £75000 and a copy described as "...a remarkably clean, fine and totally unsophisticated copy" made $135000 at Sotheby's New York in 2005. A worn copy made $60K last year and 10 years ago decent examples were making $30K. William Rees Mogg once wrote an article showing how key books such as this could be an investment and if chosen wisely could outpace inflation. He may well be right so far. You are never going to find a set now for much less than $60K unless it is defective or has had a hard life. [ W/Q ** ]

TRIVIA. O'Rourke parodies Smith's opaque prose style in his own work on him - “Pretty soon Smith gets enmeshed in clarifications, intellectually caught out, Dagwood-like, carrying his shoes up the stairs of exegesis at 3 a.m., expounding his head off, while that vexed and querulous spouse, the reader, stands with arms crossed and slipper tapping on the second-floor landing of comprehension.” Also it could be argued that Adam Smith inspired Boswell in his great biography of Johnson - he attended Smith's lectures at Glasgow University, and was captivated by Smith's remark that even the smallest detail is of interest in a great man - such as John Milton's choice of shoe laces over buckles.