Karl Marx in London: the romantic idealist exhorting man to triumph over the things he manufactures…
…The official name of KarlMarx’s circle was the German Workers’ Educational Society, and the educational aspect was taken seriously even when it had nothing to do with politics. Marx in this context wears the face of the German Gelehrter, with all the strengths and weaknesses of the type. There was nothing narrow about his educational interests. He could read all the main European languages and taught himself Russian when he was in his fifties. He read Greek and regularly reread Aeschylus. He was interested in the natural sciences and, of course, technology; he acclaimed Darwin and became highly excited when he saw a model of an electric train engine in a shop window.
—The U. S. businessmen above the corrupt priest are from left to right: John D. Rockefeller, Jr., Harry Sinclair, William Durant, John Pierpont Morgan, Cornelius Vanderbilt, and Andrew Mellon. The panel to the right of them includes the unholy triumvirate with government, represented by Plutaraco Elfas Calles in the center, flanked by a general who seems to be on the phone and a bishop.—click image for source…
For relaxation, Karl Marx would do mathematics; during his wife’s last illness he could find solace only in working on calculus. In his dealings with his young followers one sees not only Marx the political doctrinaire but also, more surprisingly, Marx the pedagogue. On the whole, the latter sounds a good deal more intimidating; “How he scolded me one day,” Wilhelm Liebknecht lamented, “because I did not know- Spanish! …Every day I was questioned and had to translate a passage from Don Quixote..” Educational bullying was obviously part of Marx’s nature, even apart from politics, and one can see in these reminiscences, the professor he at one time seemed destined to become. ( to be continued)…
ADDENDUM:
Chris Rasmussen:An analysis of Marxist conceptions of the good and the beautiful and their relationship to alienation, “Ugly and Monstrous” argues that Marxism was ultimately a set of aesthetic beliefs, one that paradoxically called for the temporary cessation of all attempts to create beautiful artwork. Marx understood beauty as Kant had – that it is the result of the harmonization of the faculties that occurs when a disinterested observer encounters a work of art. Capitalism gives to all works (art included) monetary value, and all observers become interested consumers, debasing art appreciation and killing the human desire (and need) to experience the beautiful.
Thee work of later Marxists, particularly Walter Benjamin and Herbert Marcuse, take the Marxist position to its logical conclusion, that any art in the age of capitalist exploitation and worker alienation must, by its nature, be political.The best way to judge art, according to these twentieth century Marxist aestheticians, is to measure the level of alienation the work contains. h e more alienated the artist and the work are , the more correct the political statement is. The work, which can never be pleasant and must always and ever agitate, is thus judged good. It cannot, however, be beautiful because the work retains utility –it encourages political action on the behalf of the community and the individual and is not a whole in and of itself. Beautiful art, cannot exist until a communism has been established. h us Marxist (and neoMarxist) aesthetics mandate the impoverishment of the senses and the death of beauty Read More:http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1006&context=historyrawleyconference
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