>>>Berube falls into the same problem as WBM in that he argues from
>>>the basis of
>>>what was or wasn't going on in the novel (The Great
>>>Gatsby)....This approach uses the fiction as a
>>>social document.
>>
>>
>>Imagine reading Shakespeare that way. You'd miss almost everything
>>good about it.
>
>are you agreeing with chuck or not? it's hard to tell.
I'm agreeing. Ted says Shakespeare understood money very well. That's no doubt true. But Shakespeare is as good now as he was 400 years ago not because he tells us a lot about his own time but because he is "bottomless",as a book I've been reading recently describes it. You can keep going back to the well and finding new things that are more than just information about money and humankind, although that is there of course.
I read one of Marx's kids saying she could recite from Shakespeare when she was six because her father placed such an emphasis on its importance. I don't think Marx read him only to find his thoughts on money or the transition from feudalism to capitalism.