communist manifesto

The ‘Manifesto’ in India: A Publishing History

Today’s extract features a brief history of the publication of The Manifesto of the Communist Party in various Indian languages. It has been taken from A World to Win: Essays on the Communist Manifesto (LeftWord, 1999). Also see कम्युनिस्ट पार्टी का घोषणापत्र (LeftWord, 2019; bilingual edition). The story of how The Communist Manifesto came to be available in Indian languages is not well known. The Communist Party of India was founded o[...]

लेफ़्टवर्ड बुक्स के संपादकों की ओर से

-अंग्रेज़ी में पढ़ें- प्यारे दोस्तो, भारत में इन दिनों भीड़ द्वारा ह्त्या (लिंचिंग) जैसी क्रूर और दिल दहला देने वाली घटना एक सामान्य सी बात बन कर रह गई है। आए दिन पागल भीड़ किसी न किसी बहाने से मासूम�[...]

Letter from the Editors of LeftWord Books

-Read in Hindi- Dear Friends, The BJP government has decided that it is time to turn its attention to the epidemic of lynching that engulfs India. It has asked Amit Shah, the Home Minister, to turn his languid eye towards these fires that are burning from Dadri (where Mohammed Akhlaq was lynched in 2015) to Dhatkidih (where Tabrez Ansari was lynched in 2019). If you look carefully at the record of the BJP central and state governments, it would be foolish to assume that they will be seized of [...]

Marx Turns 200

I imagine Karl Marx at his desk in the British Library, reading the Blue Books produced by the British imperial officials, studying the large books of Smith and Ricardo, spilling ink onto his coat, wondering what chaos will meet him at home. When he returns home, his children throw themselves on his bulk, demanding he read Shakespeare or the Grimm’s Fairy Tales to them. One of his children is likely sick, his wife and Helene Demuth tending to the ailing child. Marx tells Jenny Marx what he has[...]

The Birth of the Communist Manifesto

In 1848, Karl Marx and Fredrich Engels published a short pamphlet on behalf of the Communist League. Marx and Engels, both young men at that time, were tasked by the League to produce a document that would define their current situation and propose a communist path forward. This is what they did. Their text - The Communist Manifesto - arrived at a propitious time. Not long after the publication of the Manifesto on February 21, 1848, workers and peasants as well as sections of the middle class[...]