Материал: Karl Marx_ A Biography ( PDFDrive )

investigated what happened outside the factory when the capitalist came to sell his products for cash. In Volume Two Marx traced the circular movement of sale, profit and the ploughing back of resources for the next cycle of production and the complex factors underlying economic crises. This volume is far less interesting, due to its technical, theoretical nature.

The first part of Volume Three appears to be in a more or less final draft, but thereafter the book tails off without any final conclusion. It begins with a discussion of the conversion of surplus value into profit and thus the relationship between values and prices. Many people on reading Volume One had asked how it came about that, if values were measured by socially necessary labour, they should be so very different from market prices. The only answer that Marx provided to this problem was to assert that value was 'the centre of gravity around which prices fluctuate and around which their rise and fall tends to an equilibrium'.207 He continued: 'No matter what may be the way in which prices are regulated, the result always is the following: the law of value dominates the movement of prices, since a reduction or increase of the labour-time required for production causes the prices of production to fall or to rise.'208 Marx then enunciated in more detail than in Volume One the falling tendency of the rate of profit which forms the centrepiece of the third volume. This law is expressed most succinctly by Marx as follows:

. . . it is the nature of the capitalist mode of production, and a logical necessity of its development, to give expression to the average rate of surplus-value by a felling rate of average profit. Since the mass of the employed living labour is continually on the decline compared to the mass of materialised labour incorporated in productively consumed means of production, it follows that that portion of living labour, which is unpaid and represents surplus-value, must also be continually on the decrease compared to the volume and value of the invested total capital. Seeing that the proportion of the mass of surplus-value to the value of the invested total capital forms the rate of profit, this rate must fall continuously.209

Marx then went further into the nature of economic crises which he traced to the basic contradiction between the necessity of a capitalist economy to expand its production without taking into account the level of consumption that alone could make it feasible:

The real barrier of capitalist production is capital itself. It is that capital and its self-expansion appear as the starting and the closing point, the motive and the purpose of production; that production is only production for capital and not vice versa, the means of production are not mere means for a constant expansion of the living process of the society

of producers. The limits within which the preservation or self-expan- sion of the value of capital resting on the expropriation and pauperisation of the great mass of producers can alone move - these limits come continually into conflict with the methods of production employed by capital for its purposes, which drive towards unlimited extension of production as an end in itself, towards unconditional development of the social productivity of labour. The means - unconditional development of the productive forces of society - comes continually into conflict with the limited purpose, the self-expansion of the existing capital.-'10

The conclusion was:

The last cause of all real crises always remains the poverty and restricted consumption of the masses as compared to the tendency of capitalist production to develop the productive forces in such a way that only the absolute power of consumption of the entire society would be their limit.2"

Marx then dealt with the factors that could slow down the fall in profits - principally increased production and foreign trade - and attempted to show that they can only be short-term palliatives. There followed two sections on interest-bearing capital and ground rent and the volume ended with the dramatically incomplete section on classes.

Even today, Capital, particularly Volume One, remains a masterpiece. Its historical analyses present an effectively damning picture of at least one aspect of nineteenth-century England composed with an attention to detail and a superb style that make it a permanent contribution both to history and to literature. Nor have its theoretical presuppositions or long-term predictions been 'disproved' - if only because they are not susceptible of ultimate refutation: the labour theory of value is not a 'scientific' theory21-' but a theory to be judged by the insights that it gives into the workings of the capitalist system. And Marx's famous predictions are only based on his abstract 'model' of capitalist society, a model capable <>l almost infinite variation in given circumstances and, like all models, it must be assessed by its fruitfulness.2"

Capital did not immediately have the success that it later enjoyed. It was eagerly received in Marx's small circle and even his old allies Feuerliach and Ruge passed favourable comments on it. But there were disturbingly few reviews in Germany and most of them were hostile, though Engels' future adversary Diihring wrote favourably. Engels himself was the most assiduous review writer and managed to place seven, each carelully tailored to the nature of the paper in which it appeared. Kugelmann aIso acted as a very effective Public Relations Officer in Germany. Engels tried hard to get some publicity in England but the only result was a

small notice in the Saturday Review of January 1868 which said: 'The author's views may be as pernicious as we conceive them to be, but there can be no question as to the plausibility of his logic, the vigour of his rhetoric, and the charm with which he invests the driest problems of political economy.' The general attitude of Marx's trade union colleagues was summed up by Peter Fox who, on being sent a copy by Marx, replied that he felt like a man who had been given an elephant and did not know what to do with it. The reception was indeed disappointing and Jenny wrote to Kugelmann: 'You can believe me that seldom has a book been written under more difficult circumstances, and I could write a secret history that would uncover an infinite amount of worry, trouble and anxiety. If the workers had an inkling of the sacrifice that was necessary to complete this work, written only for them and in their interest, they would perhaps show a bit more interest.'214 But it took four long years before the 1000 copies were sold.

V I . L I F E I N M O D E N A V I L L A S

Although the double inheritance of 1864 undoubtedly gave Marx the relative security that enabled him to finish Volume One of Capital, it had by no means been the final solution. In April 1864 the Marxes moved to a considerably larger house in Maitland Park Road, a few hundred yards south of Grafton Terrace, where they remained for the next eleven years. To Jenny in her memoirs 1 Modena Villas (the postal address was changed to 1 Maitland Park Road in 1868) was 'a very attractive and healthy dwelling which we fitted out very comfortably and relatively smartly... .

A new, sunnily placed, friendly house with airy light rooms.'215 Indeed,

later it seemed to her to be 'a veritable palace and, to my mind, far too large and expensive a house'.216 It was one of two detached houses at the

entrance to the Park with a flower garden in front, a well-stocked conservatory and plenty of space for their two dogs, three cats and two birds. Each of the girls had her own room and Marx himself had a fine study overlooking the Park, the room in which Marx wrote Volume One of Capital and which served as a focal point for the First International. Paul Lafargue has left the following description of Marx's study:

It was on the first floor, flooded by light from a broad window that looked out on to the park. Opposite the window and on either side of the fireplace the walls were lined with bookcases filled with books and stacked up to the ceiling with newspapers and manuscripts. Opposite the fireplace on one side of the window were two tables piled up with papers, books and newspapers; in the middle of the room, well in the

light, stood a small, plain desk (three foot by two) and a wooden armchair; between the armchair and the bookcase, opposite the window, was a leather sofa on which Marx used to lie down for a rest from time to time. On the mantelpiece were more books, cigars, matches, tobacco boxes, paperweights and photographs of Marx's daughters and wife, Wilhelm Wolff and Frederick Engels.217

The books were arranged according to their contents, not their size, and were full of pages with corners turned down, marginal comments and underlinings. 'They are my slaves', Marx would say, 'and they must serve me as I will.'218 Two features of the study that were added later were gifts from his friend and admirer, Dr Kugelmann. One was a bust of Zeus of ()tricoli which had arrived - to the great consternation of the household

while the Christmas pudding was being prepared at the end of 1867; the other was a piece of tapestry that Leibniz (for whom Marx had a great admiration) had had in his study.

The money spent on furnishings (together with the repayment of debts) amounted to £500, its rent and rates were almost double those of Grafton Terrace, and, in general, it was a house whose inhabitants would be expected to have an income of around £500 p.a. - which is, in fact, about the sum of money that Marx did get through annually.219 In addition Marx and the girls took three weeks' holiday at Ramsgate and Jenny had a fortnight by herself at Brighton. In October, the girls - who before had had to decline invitations as they had no money to return the hospitality - gave a ball for fifty of their friends. The financial situation was not helped by the arrival, in May 1865, of Edgar von Westphalen. 1 le had just returned from America where - paradoxically - he had fought lor the South in the Civil War. Despite his hypochondriac tendencies, he had an enormous appetite and even the amused tolerance of Marx, who described him as 'an egoist, but a kind natured one',220 grew more and more strained during the six months of Edgar's stay.

A few months after the move, and in spite of his having made £400 by speculating in American funds,221 Marx was obliged to write to Engels yet another begging letter:

It is duly crushing, to remain dependent for half one's life. The one thought that sustains me here is that we two are executing a combined task in which I give my time to the theoretical and party political side of the business. Of course I live too expensively for my circumstances and moreover we have lived better this year than ever. But that is the one means by which the children, apart from all that they have suffered and for which they have been recompensed at least for a short time, can make connections and relationships that can assure them a future. I believe that you yourself will be of the opinion that, even looked at

commercially, a purely proletarian set-up would be unsuitable here, however fine it might have been when my wife and I were alone or when the children were young.222

hopes were momentarily raised by the death of an aunt in Frankfurt but the result was only a meagre £12. The family was soon threatened with eviction and Marx had to get small loans from acquaintances 'as in the worst refugee period'.223 The situation was made even worse by the necessity of keeping up appearances in front of Paul Lafargue, who was then paying court to Laura. Marx once again expressed a desire to go bankrupt - but instead ordered champagne and gymnastic lessons for

Laura on the doctor's advice. During 1867 Marx recognised that Engels had given him 'an enormous sum of money'224 but claimed that its effect was negated by his previous debts which amounted to £200. The next year, on his fiftieth birthday, he bitterly recalled his mother's words, 'if only Karl had made Capital, instead of just writing about it'.225 Things were so bad that Marx seriously considered moving to Geneva. The poverty was all the more glaring as Marx had become a respected figure in the neighbourhood, culminating in his election to the prestigious sinecure of Constable of the vestry of St Pancras. Marx would not accept the office, agreeing with one of his neighbours that 'I should tell them that I was a foreigner and that they should kiss me on the arse.'226

In November 1868 the financial situation became intolerable and

Engels asked Marx to let him know firstly how much he needed to clear all his debts and secondly whether he could live thereafter on £350 p.a.

(Engels himself enjoyed an income from i860 onwards of never less than

£noo.)227 Marx described himself as 'quite knocked down', asked Jenny to calculate their total debts and discovered that they were 'much larger' than he had imagined.228 Engels let himself be bought out of Ermen and Engels earlier than he had anticipated and left the firm - to his immense jubilation and the popping of champagne corks - on 1 July 1869. Three weeks later, however, Marx noticed that Jenny was still not managing with the weekly allowance that he gave her. On pressing her about it, 'the stupidity of women emerged. In the list of debts that she had drawn up for you, she had suppressed about £75 which she was now trying to pay off little by little from the house allowance. When I asked why, she replied that she was frightened to come out with the vast total. Women plainly always need to be controlled!'229 Engels accepted this with good grace and Marx's financial troubles were, at last, finished. It has been