MARX

by Robert Payne ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1968

Another of the author's rather ghoulish renditions of a revolutionary life. This one features nothing so spectacular as Payne's proof that Stalin murdered Lenin though Payne makes as much as he can out of Marx's very dull illegitimate son. But then Marx's whole life was dull from the point of view of a biographer like Payne who insists on leaving out all intellectual content. He cannot be faulted for ignorance of the new critiques by Althusser and Calvez because he majestically skips from Marx's dissertation to the fourth volume of Capital (never mentioned, for that matter) without summarizing Marx's mature theories or discussing any works but the 18th Brumairc and The Civil War in France. Unlike Lenin, Marx's revolutionary activities make poor copy: just infightings and backstabbings. We're left with a series of boils, three children dead because of Marx's chronic poverty, extensive documentation of ill-temper, and a quiet fadeout. There are some piquant quotes, from a police spy report Marx's early poetic ventures, the memoirs of his beautiful, aristocratic, long-suffering wife. But Payne also manages to ignore the most important letters (to Zasulich on Russia) and speeches (the Hague address on peaceful change). Hence we get no sense of the content of Marx's thought, much less its evolution or the climate of the times. Edmund Wilson remains the best short source on Marx's life-and-work. Stanley Hyman on style and imagery: Berlin and Carmichael's biographies, Lichtheim's theoretical exegesis, are all superior.

Pub Date: April 1, 1968

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1968

Categories: NONFICTION