"Nature is wont to impose two distinct penalties upon those who try to beat out their stock of energy to the thinnest leaf. One of these penalties Keynes undoubtedly paid. The quality of his work suffered from its quantity and not only as to form: much of his secondary work shows the traces of haste, and some of his most important work, the traces of incessant interruptions that injured its growth. Who fails to realize this-to realize that he beholds work that has never been allowed to ripen, has never received the last finishing touch-will never do justice to Keynes's powers. But the other penalty was remitted to him. In general, there is something inhuman about human machines that fully use every ounce of their fuel. Such men are mostly cold in their personal relations, inaccessible, preoccupied. Their work is their life, no other interests exist for them, or only interests of the most superficial kind. But Keynes was the exact opposite of all this-the pleasantest fellow you can think of; pleasant, kind, and cheerful in the sense in which precisely those people are pleasant, kind, and cheerful who have nothing on their minds and whose one principle it is never to allow any pursuit of theirs to degenerate into work. He was affectionate. He was always ready to enter with friendly zest into the views, interests, and troubles of others. He was generous,and not only with money. He was sociable, enjoyed conversation, and shone in it. And, contrary to a widely spread opinion, he could be polite, polite with an old-world punctilio that costs time. For instance, he would refuse to sit down to his lunch, in spite of telegraphic and telephonic expostulation, until his guest, delayed by fog in the Channel, put in appearance at 4 p.m."
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Historians from EnglandPhilosophers from EnglandUniversity of Cambridge facultyEconomists from EnglandSociologists from England
Original Language: English
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Sources
Joseph Schumpeter, "John Maynard Keynes 1883-1946", The American Economic Review, Vol. 36, No. 4 (Sep., 1946)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Maynard_Keynes
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John Maynard Keynes
1883 – 1946
Britischer Nationalökonom
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