BY C.A. CHASE

In print | Published September 25, 2008

For market matters, the focus this week has been on events most devious, truculent, and unreliable. Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns have gone bankrupt, we’re sliding down into a recession, and sooner or later we will all die. But don’t lose hope just yet. Lehman’s was partially bought out (the best, non-crumbly bits) by Barclays PLC of London. Britain, used to being a bit of a B-side in the business world, now controls an increasingly glum global market.

So while you’re crying over the only meal you’ll ever be able to afford — ramen, if you have to ask — you should know that there is someone, someone English and well-versed in miserablism and who does it archly, tongue-in-cheek, hand-in-glove better than you. And he’s making money off of it. Stephen Patrick Morrissey, the ex-frontman of ’80s English sensation the Smiths, provides much more than the perfect soundtrack for these (economically) depressed times. Though it may seem like a stretch to link an artist known for songs such as “I Know It’s Over” and “Meat is Murder” to investment banking, this isn’t a sign of excessive anglophilia. Business school curricula has been infiltrated by the so-called Pope of Mope. Business lecturers in the UK are using Morrissey lyrics to teach business students about professional relationships. “Business relationsips the Morrissey way” was penned by academics who studied Morrissey’s lyrics for twenty years (“My love is as sharp as a needle in your eye/You must be such a fool/To pass me by,” runs “Seasick, Yet Still Docked”) and are thus immune from sub-prime housing issues.

And don’t think Mr. Morrissey affects just a few English B-school grads. He’s permeated England entirely, like a sort of esthete dry-rot. One of his most prominent fans is J.K. Rowling, which by default means that she’s transmitted coded messages about vegetarianism and Myra Hindley (England’s answer to Charles Manson) in all seven Harry Potter volumes, sort of like how we have black masses hidden in heavy metal songs. What this means is that the market will now be run by i-bankers dropping words like “charming” and “fey.”

But perhaps the once perpetually-celibate Morrissey would fit right into being married to the market. It’s not such a stretch, really. What love is to Morrissey (if there’s any hint of mutuality, it’ll end in morbidity) is what money is to the rest of us, now that our taxes will be used to pay off the banks’ mistakes. It might be hard for the sensitive Morrissey to stand being around the Gordon Gekko/Patrick Bateman type, but Morrissey is no stranger to catastrophic loss himself after Johnny Marr’s desertion broke up the Smiths.

No idea what I’m talking about? Put your headphones on for The Smiths and stop with Ringleader of the Tormentors. After that, you’ll never have to study for an econ final again. I haven’t, since I’ve never taken an economics class.

C.A. Chase is a sophomore. She can be reached at cchase1@swarthmore.edu.

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