Why did coinage, tyranny, and philosophy develop in the same time and place? Marc Shell explores how both money and language give "worth" by providing a medium of exchange, how the development of money led to a revolution in philosophical thought and language, and how words transform mere commodities into symbols at once aesthetic and practical. Offering carefully documented interpretations of texts from Heraclitus, Herodotus, Sophocles, Plato, Aristotle, Rousseau, and Ruskin, Shell demonstrates the kinship between literary and economic theory and production, introduces new methods of analyzing texts, and shows how literary and philosophical fictions can help us understand the world in which we live.
- ISBN10 0801820308
- ISBN13 9780801820304
- Publish Date 1 May 1978
- Publish Status Out of Stock
- Out of Print 15 January 1993
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Johns Hopkins University Press
- Edition Illustrated edition
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 192
- Language English