…absorbing, meticulously researched…The express purpose of Karl Marx: A Nineteenth-Century Life is to dispel the dominant notion of a timeless Marx—less man, more ideological canon—and relocate him where he lived and belonged, in his own time, not ours. Standing firm against the avalanche of studies claiming Marx as forever "our contemporary," Sperber sets out to depict instead "a figure of the past," not "a prophet of the present." And he succeeds in the primary task of all biography, recreating a man who leaps off the page.
The New York Times Book Review - Jonathan Freedland
This superb, readable biography of the most controversial political and economic thinker of the last two centuries achieves what scholars have been hard-pressed to deliver in recent decades: a study of Marx that avoids cold war, ideological, and partisan commitments and arguments. A University of Missouri historian, Sperber (The European Revolutions: 1848–1851) achieves this aim by securing Marx firmly in his 19th century, and keeping him out of ours. Sperber brilliantly weaves life and ideas together in this sympathetic, if duly objective, portrait of a difficult man. Not shy of criticizing his subject’s ideas and evaluating their limitations—both philosophically and as products of their particular time—Sperber provides lucid explanations of Marx’s many complex theoretical formulations and arguments. Marx the man comes to life not only as a thinker always struggling to make ends meet, but also as a husband and father, philosophical combatant, activist, German patriot, and exile in London. Marx’s contemporaries also make vivid appearances, resulting in a book that is as much a chronicle of the events and dense ideological fights of the time that so embroiled its principal subject as a biography. A major work, this is likely to be the standard biography of Marx for many years. 34 illus. (Mar.)
"[A] balanced, fresh biography, putting the reader at ease and stimulating open-minded curiosity."
"By locating Marx squarely in the society and intellectual currents of the nineteenth century, rather than interpreting him in the light of twentieth-century history, Jonathan Sperber’s excellent biography succeeds splendidly in reshaping our image of the man and his thought."
"A passionate, intelligent and stylish book. Deborah Lutz works a kind of magic around the Brontes' possessions and evokes their lives, works and legacies more vividly than ever. A brilliantly original study that all Bronte lovers will want to read."
"[A] scrupulously detailed account of its subject from cradle to grave."
Harper's - Terry Eagleton
"Including the cast of Marx’s enemies and acolytes, Sperber superbly recounts the life Marx led."
"Doing for Marx what Ian Kershaw did for Hitler, Jonathan Sperber has given us more than just a landmark biography, but a magnificent literary and historical achievement."
"Karl Marx is our contemporary, interpreted anew by each generation—and that is as it should be. What Jonathan Sperber has done, and done wonderfully well, is return Marx to his own time. He makes us look again at the writings, through nineteenth-century eyes, and gives a vivid account of Marx's often difficult personal circumstances. Deeply researched but highly readable, this is a biography to savor."
"Working with sources not available to previous authors, Sperber offers a fresh perspective on Karl Marx and 19th-century European history in this remarkable work…. This brief review hardly does justice to a book that combines exceptional scholarship with exemplary exposition, and is among the best historical studies of this generation…. Essential."
"Sperber prefers a firmly historicist approach, and attempts, by viewing his subject purely in the context of the times, to show us a quintessentially ‘nineteenth-century life'…Sperber’s rigor…yields gems."
"The first significant Marx biography in decades… Sperber details graphically the often-times scurrilous intrigues and competitive struggles, in doing so developing a panorama of a European-wide network of artisans, revolutionaries and intellectuals… In careful detail, [he] reconstructs the genesis of Marx’s works, the influences of David Ricardo and Adam Smith on Marx’s political economy, as well as his fascination with Darwin’s theories."
"[B]rings the Brontës to life by performing a magical investigation of the objects surrounding them. Deborah Lutz exercises a dowser’s wondrous rigor; with erudition, deep feeling, and an almost mystical sense of an inanimate object’s communicativeness, she pioneers a new way of looking at detritus and keepsakes, and a new way of writing biography."
Karl Marx has been the subject of countless biographies and his writings have been adapted to the purposes of those on both the Left and Right. In this new biography, however, Sperber (history, Univ. of Missouri; The European Revolutions: 1848–1851) asks us to step back from our contemporary views of Marx and instead see him through the prism of his own life and time. Sperber argues that to understand Marx's ideas, it is not enough to know their intellectual content and context; it is also necessary to understand them within the framework of his historical period. Considering Marx's relationship to the major events of his era, including the French Revolution, European politics in the 1840s, and English industrialization, says Sperber, gives readers a nuanced and deeper understanding of his theories. VERDICT Written for a popular but thoughtful audience, this biography is lively and readable yet retains the authority of an author who thoroughly understands his sources and subject. Highly recommended.—Jessica Moran, Metropolitan Transportation Commission-Assoc. of Bay Area Govts. Lib., Oakland, CA
A thorough but starchy portrait of the father of modern communism. Sperber (History/Univ. of Missouri; Europe 1850–1914 , 2008, etc.) aims to put Karl Marx (1818-1883) squarely within the context of his time, when the French Revolution was long over and the Industrial Revolution was taking hold. He follows Marx through the watershed events of his life, tracing his restless evolution through Hegel's systematic philosophy and Ludwig Feuerbach's atheist humanism, ultimately emerging as the full-tilt revolutionary firebrand and economic diagnostician who believed communism was "the solution to the riddle of history." He also believed that capitalism was in its death throes, and--unless it sank of its own weight--only violent revolution could put it out of its misery. Sperber credibly reveals Marx's personal and political passions, ironies and contradictions; he was both Jewish and anti-Semitic, and he was an enemy of the bourgeoisie who lived off the profits of his friend Friedrich Engels' family cotton mill, which had its own share of exploited workers. For Sperber, Marx's theories of class struggle and profit were shaped by his lifetime, became hardened with age and began to seem dated not long after his death. Also, under the careful husbandry of Engels, those ideas flowered into Marxism (or as some have suggested, Engelsism), which arguably had only a tenuous connection with its founder. Sperber delivers an objective portrait, but his insights are wrested at exhaustive length and demand enormous patience from readers. His writing is dry and clumsy, and the book is so top-heavy with obtuse theoretical explanations that the life itself often gets lost. After awhile, Marx comes across as a tiresome Teutonic windbag. Authoritative in its scope, but dense and unnecessarily difficult.
