VEBLEN, THORSTEIN

Additional reading Works by Veblen. In addition to the works cited above, Veblen's books include: The Higher Learning in America: A Memorandum on the Conduct of Universities by Business Men (1918); The Place of Science in Modern Civilisation and Other Essays (1919); The Engineers and the Price System (1921); The Laxdaela Saga (trans. from the Icelandic, 1925); and Essays in Our Changing Order (1934), a posthumous collection from periodicals. Works about Veblen. Much has been written about Veblen. The basic source for students of Veblen will always be Joseph Dorfman's monumental Thorstein Veblen and His America (1934). The best short introduction to Veblen's ideas is Wesley C. Mitchell, Thorstein Veblen, his introduction to What Veblen Taught (1936), a selection from Veblen's writings. For students of economics a good appraisal is J.M. Clark's obituary in the American Economic Review, 19:742745 (1929). A general approach is David Riesman, Thorstein Veblen: A Critical Interpretation (1953), which has an extensive bibliography. Veblen's place in intellectual history is depicted in Morton White, Social Thought in America, 2nd ed. (1957), an analysis of the leading ideas of Veblen and some of his contemporaries. Douglas F. Dowd (ed.), Thorstein Veblen: A Critical Reappraisal (1958), is a collection of essays commemorating the 100th anniversary of Veblen's birth. A useful book is Max Lerner (ed.), The Portable Veblen (1948), with a strongly sympathetic introduction by the editor and a bibliography. John P. Diggins, The Bard of Savagery: Thorstein Veblen and Modern Social Theory (1978), is a later reassessment of his thought.