Introduction to New Edition
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 November 2012
Summary
On 21 September 1931 Britain was driven off the gold standard amidst an international financial crisis. The events leading up to this dramatic outcome led Keynes to reflect on his writings relating to the events of the previous 12 years.
A fortnight later, Keynes proposed to his publisher, Daniel Macmillan, that he prepare for the Christmas market a selection of his writings. Macmillan accepted the proposal two days later and told Keynes that if they could have copy by the end of the following week the firm would try to publish on 27 November. Keynes met Macmillan's deadline with a collection provisionally entitled Essays in Prophecy and Persuasion. He passed the last of his paged proofs for what became Essays in Persuasion to the printer on 9 November, the day after he finished his preface which began.
Here are collected the croakings of a Cassandra who could never influence the course of events on time. The volume might have been called ‘Essays in Prophecy and Persuasion’, for the Prophecy, unfortunately, has been more successful than the Persuasion. …
[W]e are standing at a point of transition. … There is a lull in our affairs. We are, in the autumn of 1931, resting ourselves in a quiet pool between two waterfalls. The main point is that we have regained our freedom of choice. Scarcely any one in England now believes in the Treaty of Versailles, or in the gold standard, or in the policy of deflation. These battles have been won - mainly by the inevitable pressure of events and only secondarily by the slow undermining of old prejudices.
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- The Collected Writings of John Maynard Keynes , pp. xx - xlviiPublisher: Royal Economic SocietyPrint publication year: 1978