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History of the First International
“It is not ... a mere improvement that is contemplated, but nothing less than a regeneration, and that not of one nation only, but of mankind. This is certainly the most extensive aim ever contemplated by any institution, with the exception, perhaps, of the Christian Church. To be brief, this is the programme of the International Workingmen’s Association.”
- GenresHistory
Unknown Binding
First published January 1, 1928
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
February 3, 2022
Soviet historiography is obviously far from “impartial,” if one desires or requires that, but the second section in particular on the rarely-addressed post-1872 period is quite useful no matter what.
July 26, 2024
I have my reservations, even if maybe it's entirely not its fault for boring me. I couldn't bother reading part 2, especially since most of what I needed was in part 1.
So the biggest issue is that he cannot write in a logical way. Bro is unfettered by structured accounts, but he ALSO sounds super vague sometimes and opinionated. He also literally quotes such big passages, like couldn't you just put that in the footnotes and summarize here? It wouldn't even be anything all that important. That said, I somehow enjoyed the footnotes (i did read most of them) so much more than the book, probably because alot of it has fun detail, like so much of it is Marx absolutely chewing someone out in his letters.
About my point on sounding opinionated. There's alot of nothing in the book too imo, like things that aren't facts and aren't exactly putting things into context. I mention this because this was also one of the things that made note taking very difficult (other than the main point of his style of spurting disparate facts). Like literally my goal with this review was to answer questions like "What were the historical circumstances leading to the formation of the First International?" Which I can kind of answer, but not really because my notes are fucking confusing. Like the entire point was to read a history book that gives me context for Marxism and Marx's writing, but I can't make the best use of it if I'm sure I won't be able to remember it.
So the biggest issue is that he cannot write in a logical way. Bro is unfettered by structured accounts, but he ALSO sounds super vague sometimes and opinionated. He also literally quotes such big passages, like couldn't you just put that in the footnotes and summarize here? It wouldn't even be anything all that important. That said, I somehow enjoyed the footnotes (i did read most of them) so much more than the book, probably because alot of it has fun detail, like so much of it is Marx absolutely chewing someone out in his letters.
About my point on sounding opinionated. There's alot of nothing in the book too imo, like things that aren't facts and aren't exactly putting things into context. I mention this because this was also one of the things that made note taking very difficult (other than the main point of his style of spurting disparate facts). Like literally my goal with this review was to answer questions like "What were the historical circumstances leading to the formation of the First International?" Which I can kind of answer, but not really because my notes are fucking confusing. Like the entire point was to read a history book that gives me context for Marxism and Marx's writing, but I can't make the best use of it if I'm sure I won't be able to remember it.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews