Description
Throughout the nineteenth century, German philosophy was haunted by the specter of the French Revolution. Kant, Hegel and their followers spent their lives wrestling with its heritage, trying to imagine a specifically German path to modernity: a "revolution without revolution." Trapped in a politically ossified society, German intellectuals were driven to brood over the nature of the revolutionary experience.
In this ambitious and original study, Stathis Kouvelakis paints a rich panorama of the key intellectual and political figures in the effervescence of German thought before the 1848 revolutions. He shows how the attempt to chart a moderate, reformist path entered into crisis, generating two antagonistic perspectives within the progressive currents of German society. On the one side were those socialists-among them Moses Hess and the young Friedrich Engels-who sought to discover a principle of harmony in social relations, bypassing the question of revolutionary politics. On the other side, the poet Heinrich Heine and the young Karl Marx developed a new perspective, articulating revolutionary rupture, proletarian hegemony and struggle for democracy, thereby redefining the very notion of politics itself.
A remarkable history of the formation of Marxist thought
About the Author
Stathis Kouvelakis is a reader in political theory at King's College London. He is author and editor of many books, including the La France en revolte. Luttes sociales et cycles politiques (Textuel, Paris, 2007), Critical Companion to Contemporary Marxism (Haymarket, New York, 2009) and Lenin Reloaded: Toward a Politics of Truth (co-edited with Sebastian Budgen and Slavoj Zizek, Duke University Press, Durham, 2007), a book translated in German, Italian, Spanish and Turkish.
For years Kouvelakis was prominent member of the Syriza, Greece's far left political party. He even had a leadship role during their rapid ascent from a protest movement to the governing party of the beleaguered country, but resigned with thousands of other party members following the Prime Minister's capitulation to Troika in the summer of 2015.
Reviews
Perhaps the first truly original new version of [Marx's] formation since Auguste Cornu's monumental postwar history ... but also a new theory of what is structurally most central and distinctive in Marx's achievement, namely the unique political nature and powers of the proletariat. -- Fredric Jameson, from the Preface
Book Information
ISBN 9781859844717
Author Stathis Kouvelakis
Format Paperback
Page Count 450
Imprint Verso Books
Publisher Verso Books
Weight(grams) 619g
Dimensions(mm) 206mm * 152mm * 30mm
In this ambitious and original study, Stathis Kouvelakis paints a rich panorama of the key intellectual and political figures in the effervescence of German thought before the 1848 revolutions. He shows how the attempt to chart a moderate, reformist path entered into crisis, generating two antagonistic perspectives within the progressive currents of German society. On the one side were those socialists-among them Moses Hess and the young Friedrich Engels-who sought to discover a principle of harmony in social relations, bypassing the question of revolutionary politics. On the other side, the poet Heinrich Heine and the young Karl Marx developed a new perspective, articulating revolutionary rupture, proletarian hegemony and struggle for democracy, thereby redefining the very notion of politics itself.
A remarkable history of the formation of Marxist thought
About the Author
Stathis Kouvelakis is a reader in political theory at King's College London. He is author and editor of many books, including the La France en revolte. Luttes sociales et cycles politiques (Textuel, Paris, 2007), Critical Companion to Contemporary Marxism (Haymarket, New York, 2009) and Lenin Reloaded: Toward a Politics of Truth (co-edited with Sebastian Budgen and Slavoj Zizek, Duke University Press, Durham, 2007), a book translated in German, Italian, Spanish and Turkish.
For years Kouvelakis was prominent member of the Syriza, Greece's far left political party. He even had a leadship role during their rapid ascent from a protest movement to the governing party of the beleaguered country, but resigned with thousands of other party members following the Prime Minister's capitulation to Troika in the summer of 2015.
Reviews
Perhaps the first truly original new version of [Marx's] formation since Auguste Cornu's monumental postwar history ... but also a new theory of what is structurally most central and distinctive in Marx's achievement, namely the unique political nature and powers of the proletariat. -- Fredric Jameson, from the Preface
Book Information
ISBN 9781859844717
Author Stathis Kouvelakis
Format Paperback
Page Count 450
Imprint Verso Books
Publisher Verso Books
Weight(grams) 619g
Dimensions(mm) 206mm * 152mm * 30mm
