Letter to Wilhelm Bracke, August 24, 1877

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 24 August 1877


First published, in Russian, in Marx-Engels Archives, Vol. I (VI), Moscow, 1932
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 45


MARX TO WILHELM BRACKE

IN EMS

Neuenahr, 24 August 1877 Hotel Flora

Dear Bracke,

I much regret that under the circumstances our meeting is not feasible, since this would mean interrupting your cure, which is inadvisable.

I at once started going through the proofs,[1] a task that was interrupted by the arrival of my friend Professor Schorlemmer from Manchester who, however, is only staying here for a day or two. A letter to you I began yesterday at the same time 2 will also include a few comments of mine and hence I shan't be able to finish it until I have done the proof-reading.

Apropos. I have had a letter from London from my friend Maltman Barry (a Scot). He is a former member of the General Council in London and the most zealous and competent of our British party comrades. He informs me that he is going to the Ghent Congress[2] and would like a recommendation to delegates from Germany if any should be coming. Perhaps you would be good enough to write me a note for him to this effect.

With kindest regards,

Yours,

Karl Marx

  1. ↑ Marx means the editing of the German translation of Prosper Olivier Lissagaray's Histoire de la Commune de 1871, which occupied him between October 1876 and August 1877 (for details, see Note 194).
  2. ↑ The reference is to the international socialist congress in Ghent convened by the Belgian Proudhonists and the Swiss anarchists. They made a fresh attempt to unite all the socialist organisations in Europe on their platform. Present at the congress, which took place between 9 and 16 September 1877, was a group of Marxist delegates, including Wilhelm Liebknecht, Johann Philipp Becker and Leo Frankel, who opposed the anarchists. The majority confirmed the resolutions of the Hague Congress of the International (1872) on the need to set up national political parties in their own right in line with the principles of the International Working Men's Association.