Comedy and Crisis: Pieter Langendijk, the Dutch, and the Speculative Bubbles of 1720 by Joyce Goggin and Frans De Bruyn (review)

Abstract

Why should theatre historians invest in a book about a financial scandal in the Netherlands? People have been investing in commodities for as long as traders have sailed the seas, but the first stock market was in Antwerp, and the first joint stock was issued by the Dutch East India Company. By early in the 18th century, investing in stocks or commodities was popular across Europe despite the way that bubbles occurred, a bubble being the point when a stock’s price is far higher than its value. When investors ignore this disparity, they lose their money when the market crashes. Specifically in 1720, investors in England, France, and the Netherlands lost fortunes. The South Sea Bubble in London, the Mississippi Bubble in France, and the Wind Trade (or windhandel) in the Netherlands ruined thousands. As one might imagine, such an economic collapse created a “cultural outpouring” of mocking satire, as well as angry demands to repair the system, particularly in the Netherlands. As Goggin and De Bruyn write,