Adventures in Marxism

Cover
Verso, 1999 - 288 Seiten
A new beginning for Marxism might just be on the horizon of a landscape despoiled by Soviet communism and a now wobbling world capitalism. The attention attracted by the 150th anniversary of The Communist Manifesto included laudatory references to Marx in venues as unexpected as The New York Times and The New Yorker. More predictably, the tributes in such publications focused on the strength of Marx as a critic of capital or a powerful wordsmith, rather than as an advocate of communism. But, if Marxism is to enjoy a rebirth in the coming century, appreciation needs to move beyond its value as a critical tool or a literary pleasure. The emancipatory potential of Marxism, its capacity to configure a world beyond the daily grind of selling one’s labor to stay alive, will have to be established anew. No one has made a better start to this task than the esteemed critic and writer Marshall Berman. Berman first read The Communist Manifesto in the same week as Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman while at high school. A few years later, now a student at Columbia University, he was handing out copies of Marx’s 1844 Manuscripts, purchased for 50 cents each at the (Soviet) Four Continents Bookstore in New York, as holiday presents for friends and relatives. Here was the beginning of a lifelong engagement with Marxism that, as this volume demonstrates, has been both consistent and refreshing. In these pages are discussions of work on Marx and Marxism by Edmund Wilson, Jerrold Siegel, James Billington, Georg Lukcs, Irving Howe and Isaac Babel. They are brought together in a single embrace by Berman’s spirited appreciation of Marxism as expressive, playful, sometimes even a little vulgar, but always an adventure.
 

Ausgewählte Seiten

Inhalt

Caught Up in the Mix Some Adventures in Marxism
1
Marx The Dancer and the Dance
19
Freedom and Fetishism
37
Still Waiting at the Station
57
Studs Terkel Living in the Mural
65
The People in Capital
79
All That Is Solid Melts into Air Marx Modernism and Modernization
91
The Signs in the Street
153
From Paris to Gdansk
171
Georg Lukacss Cosmic Chutzpah
181
Isaac Babel Waiting for the Barbarians
207
Meyer Schapiro The Presence of the Subject
221
Walter Benjamin Angel in the City
237
Unchained Melody
253
Index
269
Urheberrecht

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Autoren-Profil (1999)

Marshall Berman is Distinguished Professor of Political Science at City College of New York and CCNY Graduate Center, where he teaches political theory and urban studies. He writes frequently for The Nation and The Village Voice, and serves on the editorial board of Dissent. He is the author of The Politics of Authenticity ; All That Is Solid Melts into Air ; and On the Town.

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