Customer Reviews

Frozen Desire: The Meaning of Money

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

James Buchan is not apt to win friends or influence people in the world of commerce with the views put forth in this book, but he has won my undying gratitude. His strong opinions caused me to reflect deeply on the meaning of money in my own life and my responsibilties towards it. While I disagree strongly with some of his conclusions, I admire both his scholarship and his literary skills. My hat is off to this masterpiece of misarguria.

This book is hard to categorize...is it philosophy, economics, history or essay? It has to be all of these, and while it is not fully satisfactory in any of these categories, never quite reaching its stated and implied aims, it is a fascinating read. For one thing it is beautifully written, in a rich meandering prose, which gives the seemingly dull subject a shine like the gold around which the tale is woven. There are fascinating characters, stories and vignettes, and the book suceeds in at least stirring the reader to question the nature of money, even if it does not provide answers.

James Buchan has produced a history of money: thoroughly researched, scholarly,and accurate; But also, highly opinionated, literate and a joy to read. This is not the money of the economists or the financiers...this is the money of the writers and artists..... it probably wont help you make any money, but it will give you a lot to think about. Highly recommended.

James Buchan has written an enthralling book about the history and impact of money. He treats money as an evolving concept from early Greek writings to symbolic references in art. He considers the ability of money to speak for human desire, including its role in the primary needs to wage war and to make love. The book's style shifts from detailed historical review to literary criticism, so it is not always an easy read, but it is always fascinating. We at getAbstract recommend this book to executives who want to learn more about money's intrinsic power. Read it to learn how money shapes your world in ways you may not have considered.

I've recommended this book to countless people, but until now have never looked at the Amazon page. I'm amazed there are only a relative handful of reviews for such an amazing book. It's simply wonderful. Enuf said.

I stumbled across this book whilst reading a compilation of book reviews by Frank Kermode (itself well worth reading). It sounded interesting and had clearly been found to be both informative and enjoyable by someone widely regarded as one of the foremost literary critics of the last few decades.
Frozen desire is an interesting mix of historical information, monetary theory, literary allusion and personal opinion. It contains accounts of the early origins of money and a consideration of what money really is (beyond the dollars and cents). There are generally understandable (to the non specialist such as this reader) accounts of key developments such as double entry book keeping and the development of the concept of credit. But it is much more than a finance manual containing as it does biographical backgrounds for key figures, such as John Law (unknown to me), Karl Marx and many others. There is an interesting chapter on the author's forebears and their involvement with the financial world. And, as mentioned, it is full of literary allusions from classical Greece through to the 20th century. It does become somewhat polemical towards the end with the authors anticipation (and apparent hope) that the time is coming when money will be displaced from its current place as the modern world's surrogate divinity.

This is a very unusual and original work that the author acknowledges to be "amateur and impressionistic" (11). Its manner is highly personal. Buchan challenges the reader with opaque, cryptic, sometimes hyperbolic modes of expression. An erudite man, he assumes his reader is well grounded in history and literature.

Buchan's thinking is often difficult to follow and is expressed in a manner designed to force the reader to slow down and reflect. This is a book for pondering and rereading. As he anticipated (268), professional readers have tended to dismiss it. One wrote: "'Frozen Desire' [shows] and the ticks and twitches of too much research, too many lost hours amongst the library stacks, show on almost every page. Unsure why it started, the book upends itself by closing with . . . hopeless, romantic idealism." But ecologist Peter Warshall of Whole Earth Catalog, who holds a Ph.D. in biological anthropology from Harvard, called Buchan "the only nonfiction writer willing to trek into this dangerous world . . . His breadth is huge, from Homer to Rembrandt to liability/asset management to John Law. And quixotic. . . . An accomplished writer with a roller-coaster style that loops you back to read the best paragraphs two or three times."

Buchan hoped 'Frozen Desire' would "survive for a while as a sort of by-way of the study of money, like an alley one enters to escape the blinding, crowded street" (268), and there are many signs that this has come to pass.

If you are looking for a book which gives a detailed explanation and description of "money", to include the history of money, you will not easily find it in this book. I've always thought that "money" could be roughly described as a useful medium of exchange, at least as a starting point. I wanted to learn more. Instead I found this book to be meandering, very "literary" and often confusing. The author seems to have only one main goal in this book - to expose himself and his literary skills, as evidenced by all the flowery language, the metaphors and the references made to his own historical experiences. As one positive reviewer put it, "this is not the money of the economists or the financiers...this is the money of the writers and artists". That is a brief description but a good one, which is one reason I can not recommend this book. As another positive reviewer put it, this book "is an interesting mix of historical information, monetary theory, literary allusion and personal opinion". Not quite. Instead it is a somewhat CONFUSING mix of historical information, monetary theory, literary allusion and personal opinion. And yet that reviewer gave this book 4 stars. For all of that I give this book only one star - not recommended.