#commodity form

In order to understand the “full story” of the development of capitalism, we must turn to a consideration of the “value form” of products, which is identical with the “commodity form” of property and which in the same sense contribute to “commodity fetishism”, and results from the historical/ anthropological conditions of simple commodity production and exchange. Marx’s economic construction of “value form” is necessary in order to account for the “social form” of the products of labor in commodity societies that organize need and want however nominally through exchange and exhibit in embryo the system of private property and alienation. The commodity form of property and the value form of products represent only the very beginning foundations or initial conditions for organizing society around accumulation of ever increasing exchange value (capital). That is, commodity production and exchange based on the simple form of value prepare the way for capitalist civilization.

“Hard times are coming, when we’ll be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now, can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine real grounds for hope. We’ll need writers who can remember freedom – poets, visionaries – realists of a larger reality.

Right now, we need writers who know the difference between production of a market commodity and the practice of an art.”

Sometimes, I walk through the street When someone solicits me with papers, pamphlets Promising to explain away the horror of the world.

What a small price to pay, then, To rid oneself of guilt: An annual meeting A monthly subscription A weekly prayer A daily burning dreamcatcher

I have trouble saying no to these people Who promise so much; I like their attention, their earnest words That so often, they do in fact believe. The lie is not in their spirit but in the state of affairs. I let them speak, turn my back, and walk away Borrowing their thoughts.

–

Walking through costco aisles, Overloaded with nasal sensations, Free samples (free as in beer, not free as in freedom) Steam hauntingly, various foods of various ethnic origin Waiting to be devoured and inspire a greater hunger

Sometimes, I’ll be cajoled into taking a bite The sensation of the moment contains its own shadow, (The absent horror of the thousandth bite)

How sad to be an unwanted free sample All these ghosts of future promises Contained in just 500 characters and some curated portraiture Yet unable to summon a first impression That would betray my bleeding optimism

–

This review assesses Shakespeare’s influence on Marx’s “Capital”. One example used to facilitate is Marx’s reference to Timon while elaborating the theory of fetishism — demonstrating his point about how money is a form of mere fetish, how people who own money acquire special “mystifying” powers in context of their social position. Turning to “Timon of Athens”, Shakespeare writes about this “distorting” effect in his own terms, expressing its relative coercive power in 1623:

“Gold? yellow, glittering, precious gold? No, gods,

I am no idle votarist: roots, you clear heavens!

Thus much of this will make black white, foul fair,

Wrong right, base noble, old young, coward valiant.

Ha, you gods! why this? what this, you gods? Why, this

Will lug your priests and servants from your sides,

Pluck stout men’s pillows from below their heads:

This yellow slave

Will knit and break religions, bless the accursed,

Make the hoar leprosy adored, place thieves

And give them title, knee and approbation

With senators on the bench: this is it

That makes the wappen’d widow wed again;

She, whom the spital-house and ulcerous sores

Would cast the gorge at, this embalms and spices

To the April day again. Come, damned earth,

Thou common whore of mankind, that put’st odds

Among the route of nations, I will make thee