On Marx's "not a marxist"

[Phil Gasper]

>Jim Heartfield:
>> 'Just as Marx used to say about the French "Marxists" of the late
>> seventies: "All I know is that I am not a Marxist."'
>> Engels. letter to Conrad Schidt, 5 August 1890, Collected Corres., Ed.
>> Dona Torr, L&W, 1934 p 472
>>
>> E Philion <philion at hawaii.edu> writes
>> >TITLE(s):        Karl Marx's theory of revolution /  by Hal Draper.
>> >                 New York :  Monthly Review Press,  c1977-1990.
>> >Partial cont.:   1. State and bureaucracy. 2 v. -- v. 2. The politics of
>> >                   social classes -- v. 3. The "Dictatorship of the
>> >                   Proletariat" -- v. 4. Critique of other socialisms.
>>
>
>a bit late with my 2 cents as usual...I should probably save this since
>the question at hand comes up periodically and I always have to look
>up the cite again before posting the info...
>
>in Vol. II of above, "The Politics of Social Classes', Draper (pp. 5-8)
>maintains that we know the quote (or a variant) because Engels
>mentioned it 4 times...
>
>1.  a letter to Bernstein in 1882 in which E states that Marx said
>to Lafargue about French 'Marxism':  'what is certain is that, as for
>me, I am no Marxist'...
>
>2.  a letter to Schmidt in 1890 in which E recounts that M said
>about French 'Marxists' of the late 1870s:  'All I know is than I am no
>Marxist'...
>
>3.  a letter to Lafargue in 1890 in which E reminds L of the French
>who went in for Marxism and of whom M said the same as #2...
>
>4.  a piece published in 1890 in the Social Democratic party newspaper
>in which E writes that M said of the prevailing French 'Marxism' of
>the late 1870s:  'all I know is than I am  no Marxist'...
>
>Draper also notes a thirdhand account from Lopatin, the Russian
>Populist translator of _Capital_, who wrote that Engels had told
>him that M said of the French Marxists:  'I can say only one thing,
>I am no Marxist'....and D indicates that M's other French son-in-law,
>Charles Lonquet wrote in a 1900 preface to _Civil War in France_
>that M had said:  'Still and all, I am no Marxist'...Michael Hoover

David McLellan says that "a similar remark [is] retailed by [Wilhelm]
Liebknecht, quoted in K. Marx, *Dokumente seines Lebens* [Berlin, 1970],
p.363." So we can be pretty certain that Marx said it, but what did he
mean? Draper's discussion (which I had forgotten) is quite nice: "At the
risk of overkill in explaining a joke-always a lugubrious thing to do-it
must be pointed out that evidently Engels has not the slightest idea of the
profound meanings that will be read into this." Suffice to say there are no
profound meanings. Marx was simply pointing out that his self-described
followers in France actually (and presumably unknowingly) had serious
disagreements with him.

Phil Gasper
ptrg at sirius.com
415-522-1895