Introduction: The Unfinished Critique of Capital

Karl Marx started to write Capital after he had begun his rigorous studies of political economy. A momentary alleviation of the huge economic problems that had beset him for years allowed Marx to spend more time on his studies and to make significant theoretical advances. Marx also paid special attention to various economists opposed to Ricardian theory, such as the socialist Thomas Hodgskin. Marx also informed Friedrich Engels that, feeling ‘more or less able to work again’, he was determined to ‘cast the weight off his shoulders’ and therefore intended to ‘make a fair copy of the political economy for the printers. In August, Marx wrote to Ludwig Kugelmann that ‘accumulated debts’ had become ‘a crushing mental burden’ and that he had even been thinking of moving to the United States. Marx had to spend much more time on the translation than he had planned for the proof correction.