Recent reading
Nov. 29th, 2020 03:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
luzulaWelcome, new people from the friending meme! Uh, I guess you get some historical geekery now...don't say I didn't warn you. : )
Rights of Man by Thomas Paine (1792)
I listened to the Librivox audiobook. This is a bit later than the period I'm mostly being geeky about, but references to it have just turned up in so many different places that I wanted to hear what it said. For context, if you don't know, it was written as a response to another English book attacking the French revolution, but it's also a lot about the American revolution. It must've been very refreshing to hear such a direct attack on monarchy and the aristocracy! I can well understand that it was so widely read.
Although it does make me a little...sad, maybe? when he writes that if we only had a republic and a constitution, nobody would ever complain about taxes anymore, because they had the means of influencing them, and also there would be no reason to make war. Yes, I am sure nobody in the US or France ever complains about taxes today. *irony* It's a bit like reading suffragists who thought that if only women had the vote, all social problems would be solved. Or Emma Goldman being excited about the Russian revolution, but then disillusioned when she saw how it turned out. I guess everything is always more complicated and our work is never done.
I think the can of worms that Paine avoids fully opening is property. I mean, many of the arguments that he makes against the political power of inherited monarchy/aristocracy (that it was originally established by conquest; that even if one king is wise, his son could be an idiot, etc) would also apply to inherited wealth...and the point about conquest would apply to, um, basically all of the US which he so admires! He quotes approvingly a French revolution principle that the right to property is sacred, and OTOH, then talks approvingly about the properties of the Catholic church in France being taken away. And didn't the French nobility lose their estates? But maybe that was after 1792. I note with some bogglement that he argues against colonialism because it costs more to the occupying country than what they gain from it. *skeptical*
But when he is suggesting a system of taxation, he says that Although an enquiry into the origin of [the aristocracy's] estates be unnecessary, the continuation of them in their present state is another subject. And then he proposes a sharply progressive tax on estates that would discourage primogeniture, and with time would lead to the estate being divided among more and more people. Can't find the quote now, but I think he did not want any tax on commercial profit though? But he does want to set up a proto-welfare state, with pensions for everyone and free schooling for the poor, and is against regressive taxes.
I think it's kind of fascinating how Paine blithely writes a book of 96K words (almost ten hours when read out loud) to expound his principles, in a country in which a lot of people still can't read, instead of something short and pithy. And nevertheless it was a huge success, and a lot of people did read it, or had it read to them.garonne, you had read the claim that it was written in order to be read out loud, hadn't you? That's actually one reason I chose to listen to it as read by amateurs. By modern terms, I suppose the sentence structure is still a bit complicated, but then, the convergence of written and spoken language is apparently one of the great linguistic changes in English over the last hundred years (at least I heard a linguist say so).
...Britain never did get a constitution, did it?
Rights of Man by Thomas Paine (1792)
I listened to the Librivox audiobook. This is a bit later than the period I'm mostly being geeky about, but references to it have just turned up in so many different places that I wanted to hear what it said. For context, if you don't know, it was written as a response to another English book attacking the French revolution, but it's also a lot about the American revolution. It must've been very refreshing to hear such a direct attack on monarchy and the aristocracy! I can well understand that it was so widely read.
Although it does make me a little...sad, maybe? when he writes that if we only had a republic and a constitution, nobody would ever complain about taxes anymore, because they had the means of influencing them, and also there would be no reason to make war. Yes, I am sure nobody in the US or France ever complains about taxes today. *irony* It's a bit like reading suffragists who thought that if only women had the vote, all social problems would be solved. Or Emma Goldman being excited about the Russian revolution, but then disillusioned when she saw how it turned out. I guess everything is always more complicated and our work is never done.
I think the can of worms that Paine avoids fully opening is property. I mean, many of the arguments that he makes against the political power of inherited monarchy/aristocracy (that it was originally established by conquest; that even if one king is wise, his son could be an idiot, etc) would also apply to inherited wealth...and the point about conquest would apply to, um, basically all of the US which he so admires! He quotes approvingly a French revolution principle that the right to property is sacred, and OTOH, then talks approvingly about the properties of the Catholic church in France being taken away. And didn't the French nobility lose their estates? But maybe that was after 1792. I note with some bogglement that he argues against colonialism because it costs more to the occupying country than what they gain from it. *skeptical*
But when he is suggesting a system of taxation, he says that Although an enquiry into the origin of [the aristocracy's] estates be unnecessary, the continuation of them in their present state is another subject. And then he proposes a sharply progressive tax on estates that would discourage primogeniture, and with time would lead to the estate being divided among more and more people. Can't find the quote now, but I think he did not want any tax on commercial profit though? But he does want to set up a proto-welfare state, with pensions for everyone and free schooling for the poor, and is against regressive taxes.
I think it's kind of fascinating how Paine blithely writes a book of 96K words (almost ten hours when read out loud) to expound his principles, in a country in which a lot of people still can't read, instead of something short and pithy. And nevertheless it was a huge success, and a lot of people did read it, or had it read to them.
garonne, you had read the claim that it was written in order to be read out loud, hadn't you? That's actually one reason I chose to listen to it as read by amateurs. By modern terms, I suppose the sentence structure is still a bit complicated, but then, the convergence of written and spoken language is apparently one of the great linguistic changes in English over the last hundred years (at least I heard a linguist say so). ...Britain never did get a constitution, did it?
(no subject)
Date: 2020-11-29 06:04 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2020-11-29 06:54 pm (UTC)ETA: Er, just to be clear, we are sadly still a monarchy, just one where the king is not supposed to have any political power (but still costs unnecessary amounts of money).
(no subject)
Date: 2020-11-29 07:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2020-11-29 08:28 pm (UTC)