vitanola
I'll Lock Up
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My favourite Marx story is how he calculated that by swapping to a cheaper brand of cigars, and then smoking a lot more of them, he could save money. He pursued this intractable logic until his doctor to persuaded him that he was in danger of killing himself. Sounds like a political parable doesn't it?
Well, the tale was reported as early as 1910 in Spargo's excellent "Karl Marx, His Life and Work".
"Out of this necessity for economy, he developed a" theory of saving" which he used to amuse his associates, little dreaming that such a theory would one day be held by some of the British economists. Having discovered a brand of cigars --dubbed "cabbage smokes" by his friends-- which cost eighteen pence a box less than those which he had been using, he argued that he thus "saved" eighteen pence eich time he consumed a box. If only he could manage to smoke a box a day he could in a pinch liv on his "savings"."
The cigar story was one of Marx's jokes which was taken all too seriously by some who had little sense of humor.