Rare indeed are historical novels using financial manias as a backdrop. But it wasn’t the frantic trading of tulip bulbs that inspired author Deborah Moggach to write Tulip Fever. It was a 1660 painting by a minor Dutch artist that she bought at auction. In her research she quickly discovered tulipmania and ‘thought this a wonderful symbol of human greed and passion,’ she writes on her website.
In very fast-moving fashion, Moggach tells a tale of passion and deception. Set in 1630s Amsterdam, the novel captures that city’s frenzy of commerce. Moggach brings tulipmania to life and continually surprises the reader with an imaginative plot.
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I guess this is where the conservative side of the conservative libertarian begins to show. I am conservative in my personal outlook as well; and why not? Being libertarian does not prevent you from being that. All it does is prevent you from imposing your values on other people against their will. I am fine with that. I am fine for instance with people wanting to turn to prostitution or drug addiction in the name of libertarian values.
In fact I think it is necessary that it should happen that way. If we force people to adhere to our values against their will, we are building up resentment (as well as aggressing against their rights). And people resentful towards us will begin to conspire and destroy things that we hold dear.
That is the beauty of the libertarian ideal. It allows people with similar natural tendencies to come together of their own free will and live the life that suits them best.
Having said all that I would like to thank Douglas French for focus on the social aspect of boom-bust cycle. Something that is not given the attention it deserves and for some reason has become politically incorrect today. The false signals that gets send during the boom leads to misallocation of resources which ultimately means the mismanagement of lives and we all suffer for it in our personal lives.
The end of ‘boom’ marriages does not bother me as much as the deterioration of normally healthy relationships that results from the boom. When people turn greedy (like having gold fever) and suddenly abandon the ones that they had committed their lives to and whom they depend upon, that is a reason for extreme sadness.
Such resentment is the social detail from which movements like the socially conservative right-wing as well as the liberal left-wing draw upon. Movements that can eventually destroy our liberties and with it our capacity to pursue happiness as we see fit.
Has anyone read the Thomas Mann book Douglas French references? Sounds interesting.
There’s always Dumas’s The Black Tulip, though that doesn’t really connect with the mania part.
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