ANDREW FINLAY STEWART

A WEB OF FLAX TURNS INTO A CHIMERA

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As value, linen is composed exclusively of labour, and forms a transparently crystallized precipitate of labour. In reality this crystal is very murky, however. In so far as labour is detectable in it (and not every embodiment of commodity reveals the trace of labour), it is not some undifferentiated human labour, but rather: weaving, spinning, etc. – which, in addition, are by no means the only components of its substance but of course are leavened with matter derived from nature. In order to retain linen as a merely corporeal expression of human labour one has to abstract from all that which makes it to be really a thing. Any objectivity of human labour which is itself abstract (i.e., without any additional quality and content) is necessarily an abstract objectivity – a thing of thought. In that fashion, a web of flax turns into a chimera.