Letter to Friedrich Engels, December 8, 1854

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 8 December 1854


First published abridged in Der Briefwechsel zwischen F. Engels und K. Marx, Bd. 2, Stuttgart, 1913 and in full in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXII, Moscow, 1929
Published in English in full for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 39


MARX TO ENGELS

IN MANCHESTER

[London,] 8 December 1854

Dear Frederic,

I shall be putting an article[1] into the post today, although I know the post won't go. A week today I intend to do a report on Parliament. But still I urgently request you to send me an article on Tuesday so that I can count on getting £2 more on Friday (when I draw the bill).[2] Even without that, there are various losses to be met. If there's nothing happening, you can do something on Austrian military power.[3]

You must write the pamphlet on the 'Teutonians and Slavism'.[4]

You should also read Bauer's England and Russia (written in French). Gustav Diezel, too, has written a 'fat' book on the subject.[5] Do you know Freiherr von Bode's 'Statistics on Russia'? (Appeared about six months ago.)[6]

Salut.

Your

K. M.

  1. ↑ The reference is to the last, the third unpublished article of Marx's series Revolutionary Spain, sent to New York on 8 December 1854. The manuscript has not been found
  2. ↑ Marx carried out his plans in the article 'Progress of the War' which he wrote jointly with Engels on 14-15 December 1854
  3. ↑ F. Engels, 'The Military Power of Austria'.
  4. ↑ Engels planned to write a critique of pan-Slavist ideas. Ever since his removal to Manchester in 1850 Engels had been studying the language, literature and history of the Slav peoples. As can be judged from Marx' letters to Engels of 16 May and 26 June 1855, Marx negotiated the publication of Engels' pamphlet in Germany (see this volume, pp. 535 and 539). But these plans of Marx and Engels remained unfulfilled. In April 1855 at Marx's request Engels wrote two articles on this subject under the title 'Germany and Pan-Slavism' (see present edition, Vol. 14, pp. 156-62). They were published in the Neue Oder-Zeitung and under changed titles in the New-York Daily Tribune (see Note 649)
  5. ↑ Presumably, G. Diezel, Russland, Deutschland und die östliche Frage.
  6. ↑ A. Bode, 'Notizen, gesammelt auf einer Forstreise durch einen Theil des Europäischen Russlands', Beiträge zur Kenntniss des Russischen Reiches und der angränzenden Länder Asiens.