Letter to Pasquale Martignetti, November 8, 1884


ENGELS TO PASQUALE MARTIGNETTI

IN BENEVENTO

London, 8 November 1884
122 Regent's Park Road, N. W.

Dear Sir,

On receiving your kind letter of 27th last I sent you a copy of my pamphlet The Origin etc.,[1] and I would have sent it sooner had I known for certain that your last address was still valid.

I congratulate you on the splendid progress you have made in your study of the German language. I entrust you with the Italian translation of The Origin with pleasure and confidence. I have received in the meantime an earlier and similar offer from another quarter,[2] which I have not yet accepted. In order to reject it definitively, it would be useful for me to know whether you have at your disposal a publisher who will print and publish your translation without delay.[3]

I remain with respect your devoted

F. Engels

  1. The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State.
  2. See this volume, pp. 204-05.
  3. In his reply to Engels of 18 November, Pasquale Martignetti informed him that he had conducted talks with the publisher Gennaro, who had issued the Italian translation of Engels' Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, and that the latter had agreed to publish The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State.