Literature and the Economics of Liberty
Literature and the Economics of Liberty features criticisms in a pro-market point of view about the economic interpretation of literature dominated by ideas derived from Marxism. With arguments on one of the most powerful reflections of humanity’s freedom, spontaneity, and creativity, this book also tackles literature as the product of determinate economic and social circumstances. Authors Cantor and Cox explore the idea that spontaneous order is the concept that connects the economic and cultural realms, while simultaneously respecting each other’s freedom and creativity. Literature and the Economics of Liberty also features readings of a wide range of literary classics from many different nations.
Literature and the Economics of Liberty places imaginative literature in conversation with Austruan economic theory.
Cantor and Cox submit that the Austrian school offers “the most humane form of economics we know, and the most philosophically informed.”
The book's collection of essays take free-market economics as the basis for examining, for the most part, well-known literary works by the likes of Cervantes, Willa Cather, Joseph Conrad, Charles Dickens, H. G. Wells, Thomas Mann and others.
"Bringing to bear the decisive insights of the Austrian school of economics on the practice of literary criticism, its contributors attempt nothing less than a revolution in our understanding of the western (and non-western) literary traditions."
—Michael Valdez Moses, Duke University
"This book is a radical test of the intellectual honesty and the intellectual courage of most contemporary literary scholars, critics, and theoreticians."
—Frederick Turner, University of Texas at Dallas
"Cantor and Cox are surprisingly the first critics to look to Austrian economics for literary purposes, and their groundbreaking efforts are sure to ruffle a few feathers — but also to reach audiences who otherwise might not have heard of Austrian economics."
—Allen Porter Mendenhall, Temple University