As one of the most famous economists of the twentieth century, Paul Anthony Samuelson revolutionized many branches of economic theory. As a diligent student of his predecessors, he reconstructed their economic analyses in the mathematical idiom he pioneered. Out of Samuelson's more than eighty articles, essays, and memoirs, the editors of this collection have selected seventeen. Twelve are mathematical reconstructions of some of the most famous work in the history of economic thought - work by David Hume, François Quesnay, Adam Smith, Karl Marx, and others. One is a methodological essay defending the Whig history that he was sometimes accused of promulgating; two deal with the achievements of Joseph Schumpeter and Denis Robertson; and two review theoretical developments of his own time: Keynesian economics and monopolistic competition. The collection provides readers with a sense of the depth and breadth of Samuelson's contributions to the study of the history of economics.

'This book’s editors begin with the observation that ‘perhaps 20 percent’ of Paul Samuelson’s scholarly publications ‘are clearly identifiable as studies of the history of economic thought’ (HET). As a tribute to this intellectual bequest, they have, with Samuelson’s animated collaboration, republished 17 of his HET papers and provided an exhaustive bibliography.'

William Coleman Source: Economic Record