Helen Macfarlane: A Feminist, Revolutionary Journalist, and Philosopher in Mid-Nineteenth-Century England

The Raya Dunayevskaya Series in Marxism and Humanism

by David Black

Helen Macfarlane, a young British woman, was living in Vienna when she was radicalized by the 1848 Revolution. On returning to England in 1850, she became a journalist for the radical wing of the Chartist movement. The Chartists received support from such luminaries as Karl Marx and Fredrich Engles; the latter had written on the movement's political significance. It was Marx who described Macfarlane as the most original writer in the Chartist press. Macfarlane was the first English translator of The Communist Manifesto. Her original translation is included in this edition. She is also the first of the British to comment, critically and extensively, on the revolutionary implications of Hegel's philosophy. After having been hidden for a century her stature as a revolutionary, writer, and feminist emerges in David Black's seminal work. With diligent research into her life and work, Black, in Helen Macfarlane: A Feminist, Revolutionary Journalist, and Philosopher in Mid 19th Century England, recreates her intellectual and political world at a key turning point in European history. This work also includes Macfarlane's original translation of The Communist Manifesto.

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

David Black is an independent scholar and journalist. His previous books are 1839: The Chartist Insurrection with co-author Chris Ford, Helen Macfarlane: A Feminist, Revolutionary Journalist and Philosopher in Mid-19th Century England, and Acid: A New Secret History of LSD.

Librarian's note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Jbondandrews · Rating 3 out of 5]

A different sort of biography though I would have liked to have known more about her background and more about her writings.