Karl Marx

The republication of Karl Korsch's Karl Marx (1938) makes available to a new generation of readers the most concise account of Karl Marx's thought by one of the major figures of twentieth-century Western Marxism. Originally written for publication in a series on 'Modern Sociologists', Korsch's book sought to bring Marx's work to life for an audience of non-specialist readers. As Michael Buckmiller writes in his new introduction to the work, Korsch wanted his book to serve as a passport into the non-dogmatic sections of the American labour movement. The result is a bracing, concise, and accessible overview of the entirety of Marx's thought, and a pungent history of 'Marxism' itself.

Karl Korsch (1886-1961) was one of the most significant Marxist writers of the twentieth century. Along with Georg Lukacs's History and Class Consciousness, Korsch's Marxism and Philosophy (1923) stands as one of the two major contributions to the study of the philosophical underpinnings of Marxist theory.

"The republication of Karl Korsch’s masterly study of Karl Marx provides a useful reminder of the theoretical insights of the author, made during a period of major upheaval and debate among the then faltering international communist and workers movements. The book provides, not only an in-depth examination of Marx’s core ideas and work, it is also to be viewed in many ways as a summary of much of Korsch’s understanding of Marx and Marxism. Ideas such as the principle of historical specification and Korsch’s own understanding of dialectics, political economy and historical materialism feature prominently." – Liam Conway, Marx & Philosophy Review of Books [Full review]