Misers

[poliphilo]

Whatever happened to the misers?

Back in the 18th and 19th centuries people loved their misers. There was a whole literature about them. They were mean, they stank, they hid guineas in dung-heaps, they made pies out of long dead sheep. Mr Boffin in Our Mutual Friend is an avid collector and consumer of miser-porn. Daniel Dancer, John Elwes, Vulture Hopkins- these guys were famous.

There were famous fictional misers too- Scrooge, Silas Marner, Uncle Ebenezer Balfour.

But then along came the 20th century and misers- both real and fictional- dropped out of sight.

So why don't we have them any more?

Comments

[jenny_evergreen]

That's not a good capitalist, that's a bad capitalist; the money must be spent!

Perhaps the actual mental illness kind has reduced; it's been a long time since the "Western world" has faced a time of serious deprivation, and it makes sense that that would have been a strong trigger for that kind of problem.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

So the miser is the person who dams up the flow of capital and prevents the system from working as it should- hmm, yes, I get your point.

I think you're right about deprivation.