Carrol Cox wrote: > > Pioneers as it were in the disuse of footnotes were British scholars who > liked to pretend that only readers who knew the source without a footnote > were worthy readers. Footnotes were regarded as catering to the great > unwashed who were too ignorant to recognize a quotation and its source > at sight. > Same with languages. Marx quoted ancient Greek[he was trained as classical scholar after all] without translating them. Old school Oxford scholars like Gibert Ryle used to do this too. Richard Rorty is the only contemporary I can think of who still does this. Your supposed to know these languages! As Jon Elster says: " Capital I is a work written for the happy few, by one of them. It makes no concessions whatsoever to the uneducated reader. Marx assumes that *his* readers know Latin, Greek and the main European languages. They should be as well versed in philosophy as in political economy, with a firm grasp of world history and current political affairs. Moreover, they should be able to recognize literary allusions even in fairly disguised forms. It is a book that stretches the reader's mind to its limits, as it had no doubt stretched the author's capacities. It is ,in other word, an extreme feat of creativity. In the future communist society, everyone will be capable of understanding works of this stature. Indeed, everyone will be capable of writing comparable works, and will devote most of their time to doing so. This may sound like an exaggeration, and on some interpretations of Marx it is. Yet in one sense it contains an undeniable truth. Marx was appalled by the miserable, passive existence led mid nineteenth century workers. At work they were mere appendages of the machines they operated;at home they were too exhausted to lead any sort of active life. At best they could enjoy the passive pleasures of consumption. Marx, bursting with energy, consistently creative and innovative, even despite himself when he had a work to finish, was at the extreme opposite pole. He knew the profound pleasures of creation, of difficulties overcome, of tensions set up and then resolves. He *knew* that this was the good life for man. And he strived for a society in which it would no longer be reserved for small privileged minority. Self-realization through creative work is the essence of Marx's communism." Making Sense of Marx p521. Extreme perfectionism! Sam Pawlett > Radical writers who refuse to give detailed footnotes show an utter contempt > for practical use of their work. In talking with people, in writing a leaflet, > in letters to the local paper, it gives one little margin to quote "the leading > > marxist scholar, Paul Sweezy" or "Karl Marx." Luckily both of those > writers consistently give their *bourgeois sources*, so one may quote > a parliamentary committee or the WSJ, which is much more convincing > in agitational work. > > And there are of course still people out there in the world who want > to learn on their own -- college drop-outs, ph.d.'s in literature who > want to learn some economics, what have you. Footnotes are then > like links on a web page. > > Five Bronx Cheers for all Footnote despisers. > > Carrol
