Karl Marx
Karl Marx | |
|---|---|
.png) Portrait of Karl Marx. | |
| Born |
Karl Heinrich Marx 5 May 1818 Trier, Kingdom of Prussia, German Confederation |
| Died |
14 March 1883 London, United Kingdom |
| Nationality |
Prussian Stateless (after 1845) |
| Known for | Founder of Marxism |
| Field of study | Philosophy, science, political economy, history |
Karl Marx (5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, journalist and communist revolutionary who, with the assistance of his friend Friedrich Engels, enumerated upon the societal trends and laws, refined a materialist conception of history, and developed the framework known as Marxism. He is considered the founder and first classic of Marxism.
Biography
Early life
Karl Heinreich Marx was born in Trier, Rhenish Prussia (present-day Germany), on May 5, 1818, the son of Heinrich Marx, a lawyer, and Henriette Presburg Marx, a semi-illiterate Dutchwoman, as one of 8 children (Henriette Marx, Eduard Marx, Mauritz David Marx, Hermann Marx, Emilie Conradi, Caroline Marx, and Louise Juta). He became the oldest son when his brother Mauritz died in 1819.
Both Heinrich and Henriette were descendants of a long line of rabbis. The Prussian authorities barred him from the practice of law because he was Jewish following an anti-Semitic law passed in 1815. Heinrich Marx converted to Lutheranism in about 1817. Yet he was largely irreligious and also a passionate liberal activist, being an admirer of the works of Immanuel Kant and Voltaire. However, he was still fiercely patriotic and monarchistic, and educated his family as liberal Lutherans rather than atheists. Karl was baptized in the same church in 1824 at the age of six.[1]
Education and early intellectual development
Marx as a schoolboy absorbed the ideas of the French and German enlightenment thinkers. In the fall of 1835 he entered the University of Bonn and in October 1836 he enrolled in the University of Berlin, where he studied law, history, philosophy, and art theory. In 1837 he became an adherent of Hegel’s philosophy, primarily his dialectics, and established close ties with the Young Hegelians, who drew radical atheistic and political conclusions from Hegel’s teachings.
In April 1841, Marx was awarded the degree of doctor of philosophy for his dissertation The Difference Between the Natural Philosophies of Democritus and Epicurus. In this work Marx, although still aligned with idealism and Hegelianism, already developed a certain independence of Hegel in his recognition of the classical materialist philosophers, his firm atheism, and his avowal that philosophy must take an active part in life. Feuerbach’s writings greatly influenced him, contributing to his subsequent acceptance of the materialist position. However, Marx soon became aware of certain weaknesses in Feuerbach’s system, particularly its contemplative attitude and its underestimation of the importance of political struggle.[2]
Early agitation
Socialist agitation
Initial developments of Marxism
Later years and death
See also
References
- ↑ Vladimir Lenin (1914). Karl Marx: A Brief Biographical Sketch With an Exposition of Marxism. Available on the Marxists Internet Archive.
- ↑ "Marx, Karl". Great Soviet Encyclopedia.