Die Frühschriften

Written in 1833-4, when Marx was barely twenty-five, this astonishingly rich body of works formed the cornerstone for his later political philosophy. In the Critique of Hegel's Doctrine of the State, he dissects Hegel's thought and develops his own views on civil society, while his Letters reveal a furious intellect struggling to develop the egalitarian theory of state. Equally challenging are his controversial essay On the Jewish Question and the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts, where Marx first made clear his views on alienation, the state, democracy and human nature. Brilliantly insightful, Marx's Early Writings reveal a mind on the brink of one of the most revolutionary ideas in human history - the theory of Communism. This translation fully conveys the vigour of the original works. The introduction, by Lucio Colletti, considers the beliefs of the young Marx and explores these writings in the light of the later development of Marxism. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member Kade

Karl Marx's First, Second, and Third Economic & Philosophical Manuscripts are the highpoint of this book. Written prior to Das Kapital they outline the ideas that are later fully explored in the economic treatise. A healthy explainer of Marxist thinking if you can't afford the time or effort to

study the volumes of Kapital.

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LibraryThing member blake.rosser

Marx's style is difficult to decipher. In "On the Jewish Question," it was difficult to determine exactly how ironic he was being. I've since learned that when talking about the Jewish Cult he was really referring to the Capitalist Cult, but this is far from clear, and you can see just how easily

anti-semites could have coopted these ideas for their own ends. His "Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts" seem more weighty, but I wasn't exactly sure in what way until I read Fromm's "Marx's Concept of Man" and had it explained to me. Probably not the ideal leisure book, unless you like spending more time on a text than I do (entirely possible).

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