Yesterday I received an email from Rafael Galvão de Almeida, a graduate student who is doing a research project on economists as fictional protagonists – believe it or not, there is such a sub-genre. Had I read [amazon_link id=”0552159336″ target=”_blank” ]Making Money[/amazon_link] from Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series? he asked, having read my post The Economist as Hero.
No, so I bustled upstairs to the teenage sons’ extensive Terry Pratchett library to retrieve it. Coincidentally, the new catalogue from my publisher, Princeton University Press, arrived with news of a new Marshall Jevons detective story, [amazon_link id=”0691164169″ target=”_blank” ]The Mystery of the Invisible Hand[/amazon_link]. The books in this series aim to bring economic theory to life by the plot – apparently it’s Coase and auction theory in this art market novel. Russ Roberts’ novels [amazon_link id=”0691143358″ target=”_blank” ]The Price of Everything[/amazon_link] and [amazon_link id=”0262681358″ target=”_blank” ]The Invisible Heart[/amazon_link] are an alternative, enjoyable way to imbibe a little economics without even noticing.
Economic fiction
Update: here via @MikeBenchCapon is James Andow’s fantastic list of philosophers in fiction – far, far more than the economists: https://www.academia.edu/5590924/Philosophers_in_Fiction
Actually, I’m preparing this for a blog post, but who knows if I can expand into a paper (the first paper I read on this issue was from Dr. Tiago Mata, named “The Evil Economics Does – with special emphasis on the history of late 20th century economics.”, granted it’s still a working paper, and it was a first draft)?
But Making Money is a really interesting book from the point of view of an economists, because, while Sir Terry Pratchett isn’t an economist, he did a good research on gold standard and why it had to be abandoned and then he applies to the fantasy of Discworld.
Outside literature, there is an anime named “[C] – The Soul and Money of Possibility” in which the protagonist is a Japanese economics undergrad.
The anime looks great!
http://myanimelist.net/anime/10163
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