The Accursed Share Volume 1 Consumption.pdf

The Accursed Share' An Essay on General Economy es Bataille. Volume I Consumption ZONE BOOKS· NEW YORK 1988 .~? 1988 Urzone, Inc. ZONE BOOKS 611 Broadway Suite 838 New York, NY 10012 All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic, mechanical, photo-copying, microfilming, recordine,or otherwise (except for that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the . Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press) without written permission from the Publisher Originally published in France as La Part Maudite ? 1967 by Les Editions de Minuit. Printed in the United States of America Distributed by The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England Library ofCongress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bataille, es, 1897-1962. The accursed share. Translation of: La part maudite. Bibliography: p. I. Economics. I. Title. HBI73·B3HI3 1988 330 ISBN 0-942299-10-8 ISBN 0-942299-11-6 (pbk.) 3)1\"'g WVITlIM i1nD<Jq S! <JJUDJ<JqnX::I ' I ' !iib! ￡/_'):s~~￡1/ V H '7r/1V\ Contents Preface 9 PART ONE THEORETICAL INTRODUCTION The Meanina of General Economy 19 Laws of General Economy 27 TWO THE HISTORICAL DATA I Sacrifices and Wars of the Aztecs 45 The Gift of Rivalry: "Potlatch" 63 THREE THE HISTORICAL DATA II The Conquerina Society: Islam 81 The Unarmed Society: Lamaism 93 FOUR THE HISTORICAL DATA III The Oriains of Capitalism and the Reformation 115 The Bouraeois World 129 FIVE THE PRESENT DATA Soviet Industrialization 147 The Marshall Plan 169 Notes 191 Preface For some years, being obliged on occasion to answer the question "What are you working on?" I was embarrassed to have to say, "A book of political economy." Coming from me, this venture was disconcerting, at least to those who did not know me well. (The interest that is usually conferred on my books is ofa literary sort and this was doubtless to be expected: One cannot as a