Karl Marx
Karl Marx, (1818-83). German political theorist and economist, the founder of Marxism. He was a member of a left-wing movement in Berlin and in 1843 moved to Paris, where he met his friend and collaborator Friedrich Engels. He soon became well known in Socialist circles. The Communist Manifesto (1848) was commissioned by the London Communist. League. It outlined the communist theory that the coming victory of the working classes would put an end to the class struggles of the past. After the unsuccessful 1848 revolution, Marx was expelled from Germany and took up residence in London, where he helped to organize the First International, a working men’s association, in 1864. His major theoretical works, including A Critique of Political Economy (1859) and Das Kapital (1867; 1885-94), were not financially profitable, and the Marx family became dependent on the generosity of Engels. Marx is buried in Highgate cemetery, London.
