The Flawed Genius of William Playfair : : The Story of the Father of Statistical Graphics / / David R. Bellhouse.

• VerfasserIn: Bellhouse, David R. ,
• Place / Publishing House: Toronto : : University of Toronto Press, , [2023]; 2023
• Year of Publication: 2023
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (356 p.) :; 47 colour illustrations

A product of the Scottish Enlightenment, William Playfair (1759-1823) worked as a statistician, economist, engineer, banker, land speculator, scam artist, and political propagandist. It has been claimed - erroneously - that Playfair was a spy for the British government and ran a forging operation to print the paper money of the French Revolution. The Flawed Genius of William Playfair offers a complete account of Playfair's life, richly contextualized in the economic, political, and cultural history of the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. The book explores the many peaks and troughs of Playfair's career, ranging from moderate prosperity to bankruptcy and imprisonment. Through careful analysis, David R. Bellhouse shows that Playfair was neither a spy nor a forger, but perhaps briefly a one-time courier for a government minister. Bellhouse pieces together as complete a picture as possible of the forging operations supported by the British government and illuminates Playfair's lasting contributions in economics and statistics, where he is known as the father of statistical graphics. Disputing the misinformation about the man, The Flawed Genius of William Playfair highlights that the truth about Playfair's life is often more intriguing than the fictions that surround him.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- List of Illustrations -- Preface: Playfair Is Introduced -- Acknowledgments -- 1 Playfair Is Sent to Newgate Prison -- 2 Playfair Goes to Birmingham to Work for Boulton and Watt -- 3 Playfair Goes to London to Set Up His Own Business -- 4 Playfair Evolves into a Writer by Profession -- 5 Playfair Expresses His Early Political Views -- 6 Playfair Makes His Mark on Statistical Graphics -- 7 Playfair Goes to Paris -- 8 Playfair Tries to Take Advantage of the French Revolution -- 9 Playfair Escapes from France and Returns to England -- 10 Playfair Becomes an Avid Anti-Jacobin Propagandist -- 11 Playfair Gets Involved with Forged Assignats -- 12 Playfair Starts a Bank and Goes Bankrupt -- 13 Playfair Ekes Out a Living as a Bankrupt -- 14 Playfair Has a Good Year during 1805 with Hints of Ending Badly -- 15 Playfair Has Serious Legal and Other Problems -- 16 Playfair Dabbles Deeply in Family History and Political Biography -- 17 Playfair Tries to Pull a Major Scam on Lord Bathurst about Bonaparte -- 18 Playfair Continues Writing and Tries a Few More Scams to Get to Paris -- 19 Playfair Returns to Paris -- 20 Playfair Spends His Last Few Years in England in Poverty -- Afterword: Playfair Avoids a Shakespearian Epitaph -- Appendix: Assignat Forging by French Émigrés in England -- Notes -- References -- Index