Interesting stuff.
And through it some central figures emerged: amongst them, John Maynard Keynes, a highly influential economist who has his own branch of economic theory - Keynesian economics - named after him.
It has recently come to the attention of me and some other students that there is a startling and wholly inexplicable absence of John Maynard Keynes fan fiction on the internet.
I set out to remedy this with a tasteful foray into the indulgently adjective-rich world that is the fanfiction genre...
Government Regulated Passion
"Penny, have you got those minutes done?"
Penny's head snapped up from the paperclip she had been working into different shapes over the last hour. It had become a horse, a poodle, a pineapple, and at one stage a giraffe.
"Yes Ms Moneybanks, they're right here," she replied meekly, handing the stack of impeccably typed meeting notes to the dour woman glaring at her from the other side of the desk.
"Good girl," Ms Moneybanks said blankly, taking the papers and walking off to another office somewhere where, Penny rather suspected, they would be placed on another desk, to be sorted by another person, and placed further and further into the bureaucratic jungle until it would be impossible to find, even in the unlikely event that someone wished to read them. But these were her secretarial duties in the economic policy department, and she did them well. The blonde, blue-eyed, young and ambitious Penny was not used to feeling anxious.
But she didn't suppose there was much else she could feel, not when she'd just been told that the century's most influential economist and policy advisor John Maynard Keynes had specifically requested her secretarial assistance with his latest policy initiative.
She had barely met him, yet she remembered each moment of that first gaze with an intensity that made her blush. She had been taking the water into the meeting - that was all - but as she placed the overflowing jug down she caught his eye. He had looked at her, his moustache quivering as he continued talking to the other meeting members. "The free market is not without faults," he was saying, but his dark, intensely intelligent brown eyes were locked into hers. His words (an objection to the privatisation of social projects) faded into the background and she feared she would lose herself in his chocolate button drop eyes. Finally she tore herself away...
...Penny exhaled slowly, picked up a leaflet explaining austerity measures and began to fan her bright pink face, shocked at the power of a casual recollection. She had just begun to settle back to work (though the phantom image of Keynes floated in her mind) when the office door opened. Even without looking, she knew it would be him. 3pm exactly. She raised her head as casually as she could manage, to find with a shock that the impeccably groomed economist was standing in front of her desk.
"Miss Farthing?" he said with a smile. His voice seemed to slide over her like melted butter, the rich tones warming her from head to toe.
"Yes Mr Keynes," she replied with a smile. "But please, just call me Penny."
"Very well...if you could come along to my office now we can discuss how we're going to work together on putting together this next policy proposal."
"Very well sir," replied Penny.
"Please...call me Keynes," he said, a cheeky grin spreading across his tastefully groomed face.
His room was, as she might have expected, practical but comfortable. There were no irresponsible excesses, save for a thick red rug in the centre, and a fireplace to one side, which was crackling merrily away.
"Now," he said once they were seated opposite one another at the desk. Penny noticed that the desk was not quite large enough to seat two opposite: their legs brushed against one another underneath. Neither of them commented or made any move to adjust their seating position, silently sharing the touching of limbs. "Just a few formatting things first. I like my policy documents typed up with a 3cm margin, the title of the document and chapter at the top of each page."
"Yes sir," she said with a small nod.
"...Are you going to write this down?" asked Keynes.
"Oh...if you please sir, I just remember it all myself," said Penny with a touch of pride.
"Ah, very well then," Keynes replied, his eyes sparkling with amusement or annoyance, she couldn't tell which. "Well, so overall the policy document..."
The meeting seemed to last for only half an hour, so it was with surprise that Penny glanced across at the clock on her way out and saw it was 5 o'clock. Keynes smiled at her from his desk as she left. "Very good, Penny. I shall see you tomorrow..."
As Penny caught the train home, her head was abuzz with all the ideas Keynes had shared with her. Infrastructure investment policies and lines about definancialisation buzzed through her mind, which seemed to be zipping about with more clarity and precision than she had ever believed possible from her job.
It was an unusually warm summer, and that night Penny slept with the window open, a balmy draught flowing into her room as she tried to get to sleep. Finally a dreamful slumber took her...
She was outside the office. Raising a trembling hand, she knocked a pathetic knock. She shook her head, steeled herself, and then knocked again.
"Enter," came the response from inside the room. She grasped a gold handle and opened the door. She was instantly struck by a wave of warmth, as the fire was roaring, and Keynes stood there watching her. "Well don't just stand there, come in, Penny!" he laughed - and it was a full laugh, full of energy, vitality and vigour. His moustache twitched into a smile as she stepped across the red rug, and she felt his analytical eyes roving over her crisp blue suit, the one that Mother said made her look like 'a real fancy lass'. Finally his eyes met hers again, and she felt that same giddiness seize her body.
"Penny..." he began, his considered tone reverberating through every fibre of her being, soothing her nerves like a cooling balm.
"What?" she replied breathlessly as he stepped closer.
"I believe that the financial sector is an irresponsible exchange of money which is fundamentally flawed, marked by greed and irrationality: an irrationality which is at odds with the dominant neoliberal economic governing regime."
She gazed at his sensible leather shoes as he stepped closer again. She could see his crooked tie, and as he reached out with one hand and brushed away a stray lock of her curly golden tresses she felt a blush steal into her already rosy cheeks.
"Maybe..." she began, looking across at the fireplace, which crackled and radiated heat. "Maybe we're all a little irrational...sometimes..."
"Maybe we are...and maybe we need governments to regulate our behaviours so that human failures don't become market failures," he said, gazing into her clear blue eyes.
"I believe that the financial sector is an irresponsible exchange of money which is fundamentally flawed, marked by greed and irrationality: an irrationality which is at odds with the dominant neoliberal economic governing regime."
She gazed at his sensible leather shoes as he stepped closer again. She could see his crooked tie, and as he reached out with one hand and brushed away a stray lock of her curly golden tresses she felt a blush steal into her already rosy cheeks.
"Maybe..." she began, looking across at the fireplace, which crackled and radiated heat. "Maybe we're all a little irrational...sometimes..."
"Maybe we are...and maybe we need governments to regulate our behaviours so that human failures don't become market failures," he said, gazing into her clear blue eyes.
"But human failures can sometimes be so difficult to stop," she countered. "Greed is just one of our failings. There are other weaknesses...other sins...."
"True, there are other sins. But the selfishness of greed is amplified when extended to the level of financial markets. Other, smaller selfish deeds can go surprisingly unnoticed, and without ramifications...." He again deliberately stared into her eyes, and she felt her face magnetically drawn to his. Their cheeks were almost touching now, and Penny felt that if they did she should combust.
His stiff, quivering moustache brushed against her as he leaned in and gently murmured "but ultimately I believe that the government has a valid role to play in correcting market failures through the careful implementation of intelligently designed regulations and restrictions" into her ear, his hot breath tingling against her burning skin....
The next day the minutes dragged by. Penny could not wait for 3pm to arrive. Her fingers itched to type, and so she began to type furiously, as words flooded her mind, pouring out through her lightning-fast fingertips like an electrified river of passion:
Oh Keynes, oh Keynes,
You wanted government regulation of the market.
Oh Keynes, oh Keynes,
Your eye has fixed itself upon my heart as target.
Oh Keynes, oh Keynes,
You believe in the introduction of government policies to ameliorate the inequitable distribution of wealth,
Oh Keynes, oh Keynes,
I replay your words, replay your words in my heart, and I flourish as a daffodil into full health.
Oh Keynes, oh Keynes,
You reject the neoliberal assertion of the free market as flawless,
Oh Keynes, oh Keynes!!
Stop my pounding heart, afore it compel me to actions most lawless!
She supposed she was no poet, but she knew that already. She consoled herself by moving to her work, typing up notes penned by Keynes's capable, dextrous, powerful hands. As she typed up notes on the stimulus of economic activity through government spending, she felt a shiver pass through her fingertips. As she engaged in the intimately sensual act of transposing the marks Keynes had put to paper with his sturdy fountain pen into a neatly typed document, she entered another plane of existence. As she continued to type she lost herself further and further in the rough etchings made with his well-inked nib, and she began to lose track of time, and so it came to pass that 3'o clock arrived after a tolerable intermission of transcription.
Penny set off straight up to the fifth level without waiting for Keynes to come and get her. As it was they met on the carpeted stairwell between levels. He was looking down, and almost continued past her, but she put out a hand and brushed it against the navy blue sleeve of his suit.
"Penny!" he exclaimed with a chuckle, a chuckle that faded and was replaced with seriousness as they engaged in what had now become a ritualistic moment of eye-gazing. The intense bond they were forging as they stared directly into the consciousness of the other would have continued for much longer were they not interrupted by the backlog of people they had blocked from going up and down the stairs (such was their absorption in their moment of eyeball-mediated intimacy).
As he shut the door behind him, Penny noticed that the fireplace was not roaring this time: it was smouldering. The lights too, seemed dimmer than last time: the shadows were softer, and as Keynes turned to face her, the lines of fatigue which frequently creased his face were gone, and only his magnificent moustache commanded her attention.
"Capitalism is the astounding belief that the most wicked of men will do the most wicked of good of everyone," he sighed. "The very premise of economic man assumes we are selfish actors, it assumes we are rational actors. From this, a system is created where the selfishness of each individual maintains a balance." He sighed again, and she felt the weariness of a man who did not believe that the free market is the best instrument to deliver social equality.
"Well that's why it's important to continue to challenge the hegemony of the neoliberal economic doctrine, isn't it?" said Penny, striding forwards and taking his hand with a boldness she had not known before. He smiled at the recognition of his own words, spoken back to him by our bright-eyed and inquisitive heroine.
He squeezed her hand.
"Yes, Penny Farthing. That's why we must challenge the dominance of ideas...the difficulty lies not so much in developing new ideas as in escaping from old ones."
She took his other hand and took a step closer, barely daring to breathe as she whispered, "and perhaps the most pervasive of these is the idea that we are all rational actors...for I fear I am about to do something that is quite without reason of any kind..."
Keynes didn't say anything, and there was silence but for the patter of rain on the window. His brown eyes came closer towards her, and --
Out in the street, the rain began to intensify into furious torrents, and people began to run in different directions, holding newspapers over their heads to stay dry.
