Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth (23 page)

( Acknowledgements )

This project has been a labour of love. I did it for Anansi, and for its proprietor, Scott Griffin, in particular: valour in the face of such daunting challenges as literary publishing in Canada should not go unrewarded, although it usually does.

There are many others to thank. First, my agents, Phoebe Larmore of North America and Vivienne Schuster and Betsy Robbins of the United Kingdom. From House of Anansi Press, Sarah MacLachlan and Lynn Henry. From Bloomsbury, Alexandra Pringle. Heather Sangster, tireless copyeditor. From the cbc, Philip Coulter and Bernie Lucht. From Massey College, Master John Fraser, and the two research assistants he so ably provided in the time of need, Claire Battershill and Dylan Smith.

Thanks to my very helpful first readers, Jess Atwood Gibson and Valerie Martin, and also to Drs. Ramsay and Eleanor Cook, who rightly scribbled “This is silly” in some of the margins. I hope I have managed to take those bits out, though other silly things unnoticed by them may remain. Thanks also to sounding boards David Young and Judith Timson, to whom I blathered on. Thanks also to the O. W. Toad office support staff, Sarah Webster, Shannon Shields, Laura Stenberg, Penny Kavanaugh, and Anne Joldersma, who, when things were falling apart, kept them from falling apart completely.

And finally, thanks to Graeme Gibson, who understands balances and puts up with imbalances, including mine when I’m writing books.

To all, I stand indebted.

( Permissions )

Permission is gratefully acknowledged to reprint excerpts from the following:

(p. 9) “Mortgages.” Valerie Martin. Personal correspondence with the author. Used by permission.

(pp. 19–20)
The Moral Animal
, by Robert Wright (Vintage, 1995). Copyright © 1994 Robert Wright. Used by permission.

(pp. 46–47) The Reverend Jennie C. Olbrych, comment on “Outrageous Forgiveness,”
St. James Santee Episcopal Church Blog
, comment posted September 23, 2004. Reprinted with permission.

(p. 58)
The Creation of Patriarchy
, by Gerda Lerner. Copyright © 1986 by Gerda Lerner. By permission of Oxford University Press, Inc.

(pp. 69–70) “Blair Believes He Can Do No Wrong: Ask the Antinomians,” by Sam Leith. Copyright 2006,
The Daily Telegraph.
Reprinted with permission.

(pp. 133–34) Excerpt from p. 8 of
Get Shorty
, by Elmore Leonard. Copyright © 1990 by Elmore Leonard. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers and The Wylie Agency, Inc.

(p. 196) “By 2042,
MIT
Team Says: Collapse of World Economy Foreseen if Growth Goes On,” by Paul E. Steiger. Copyright 1972,
Los Angeles Times
. Reprinted with permission.

( Index )

“amends,” concept of,
170–71

American Revolution,
142

Antinomian Heresy,
69–72

Astraea,
24–25
,
30
,
31
,
39

Athene,
37–39

Axelrod, Robert,
20

balances,
1–40

and equivalent values,
15–17

and fairness,
12–20
,
28
,
148
,
162–63

and justice,
23–40

and reciprocity,
14
,
20–23
,
27–28
,
29
,
32
.
See also
fairness; justice; justice, mythologies of

Bedonebyasyoudid, Mrs.,
22–23
,
25
,
30
,
34
,
39

Black Death,
141
,
183–87

Blair, Tony,
69–70

Blake, William,
111
,
189

borrowing and lending,
50–51
,
79–80

Buchan, James,
158

cheating,
19–21
,
112–13
,
119
,
138
,
164

by debtors,
42
,
54
,
85
,
101–102
,
105

of tax collector,
78–79

child labour,
128–29

Christ,
67–69
,
139–40
,
141

Christianity: and moneylending,
96–97
,
144–45
,
154–55

and mythology of justice,
32–34
,
40

and racism/anti-Semitism,
155–56

spiritual debt and repayment in,
67–69

and wealth,
94–97

A Christmas Carol
(Dickens),
3
,
78
,
86–99
,
120
.
See also
Scrooge, Ebenezer

Club of Rome,
196

contracts: and lawyers, as means of oppression,
115
,
117–19

protective qualifiers in,
14

as signed with Devil,
72
,
74
,
78
,
88
,
113
,
115
,
118
,
163–64

credit cards,
8
,
42
,
46–47
,
131–32

creditors: as paired with debtors,
40
,
124
,
143–47
,
150
,
152
,
163

persecution of,
144–47
,
165
,
194
.
See also
debt slavery; Devil; moneylenders

crime,
122–26

Daniel, Book of,
166

Darwin, Charles,
22
,
182

David Copperfield
(Dickens),
129–30

death: and debt,
80
,
119
,
186

as debt paid to Nature,
181
,
183–87

and time,
167–68

Death on the Installment Plan
(Céline),
72

debt,
9–10

and death,
80
,
119
,
186

due date for,
166–73

and equivalent values,
15–17

and fairness,
12–15
,
51
,
118
,
152
,
162–63

and human nature,
10–15

as incurred by rulers,
134–47
,
165
,
181–83
,
193–94

and memory,
75
,
76
,
78
,
81
,
141–42
,
163

nonpayment of,
56–59
,
126–34

as not always paid back with money,
113
,
118
,
125
,
147–61

trickle-down theory of,
101–103
.
See also
“Debtor” (life game); taxation

debt, as owed to Nature.
See
environment, mankind’s payment of debt to; environment, threats to

debt, as plot,
81–121
,
164

in
A Christmas Carol
,
86–99

excitement/entertainment value of,
82–83
,
85–86

in Faust story,
74
,
82
,
88–93

in
The Mill on the Floss
,
108
,
114–19

and “ruin,”
106–108
,
114–17

in
Vanity Fair
,
101–103
,
104–105

and women,
101–103
,
104–108
,
114–19

debt, and sin,
41–80
,
163–64

Devil’s role in,
63
,
67–68
,
71–74
,
78

and forgiveness,
44–49
,
75

and pledging/ pawning of items,
51–56

and pledging/pawning of souls,
59–69

redemption of,
51
,
54
,
56
,
59
,
63
,
64
,
66
,
67–70
,
164

and slavery/oppression,
56–59
,
78–79
,
92–93
,
127

and substitution/sacrifice,
63–67
,
72–74
,
179

and taking vs. trading,
49–51

debt management,
6–7
,
41–43

“Debtor” (life game),
83–84
,
85–86
,
119
,
121

“Try and Collect” version of,
85
,
101–102
,
105
,
131
,
133

debtor and creditor, as paired,
40
,
124
,
143–47
,
150
,
152
,
163

debtors’ prisons,
105
,
127–31
,
165

debt relief,
182–83
,
199

debt slavery/oppression,
56–59
,
127

lawyers’ role in,
115
,
117–19

by moneylenders,
78–79
,
92–93
,
96–97

and patriarchy,
58–59

and records,
78–79

Defarge, Madame,
149

“The Deil’s Awa’ wi’ the Exciseman” (Burns),
79