Karl Korsch: A Review Essay

Abstract

Few NORTH AMERICAN STUDENTS of the history of the labour movement and socialism know very much about the life and work of Karl Korsch. Of course, many know of him ? as the 'poor cousin' of George Lukacs in the school of * Western Marxism' popularized by Maurice Merleau-Ponty, as a Frankfurt School tag-a-long, or as Bert Brecht's close friend and teacher. For historical and linguis tic reasons Korsch's work is better known in Germany (more accurately in the Federal Republic of Germany, for is reviled in the German Democratic Republic), yet even in his native land the general unavailability of many of his writings has prevented even his most enthusiastic readers from grasping the totality of his practical and theoretical contribution to the working-class movement. This is lamentable for was perhaps the most sensitive student of Marx in the twentieth century. (Franz Borkenau, in a review of Korsch's intellectual biography Karl Marx, wrote: Korsch possesses a model knowledge of every imaginable literature connected with Marxism_I have little doubt that his is the Marx-study most solidly close to the actual teaching of Marx. Where every other author instinctively attempts to reinterpret Marx on his own lines of thought, Korsch, I believe, successfully tries to interpret Marx's own line of thought.) Fortunately this sorry state of affairs is changing for the better due largely to the efforts of Michael Buckmiller and his colleagues Gotz Langkau and Jiirgen Seifert, who are bringing out Korsch's collected works (in 12 volumes) over the course of this decade. The recent appearance of the first two volumes in the planned series gives us cause to rejoice.