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Many who have not read Marx
have heard that he is “unreadable,” but in this
article Humphery McQueen celebrates the colour
and humour of Marx’s writing, the use of
metaphor, paradox, pun, irony, classical
allusion and all the devices of the writer’s
art. True, there are passages! the endless
manipulation of prices and quantities of coats
and cloth in Capital which often add little to
the point already made, the obsessive, almost
paranoiac bombast of works like Herr Vogt, but
some of his prose ranks with the best of its
kind, and should be enjoyed. It seems that Marx
used these literary devices to achieve a depth
of analysis which the normal “scientific” mode
of exposition could never achieve.
Critiques & Rejoinders for “Reading the
‘unreadable’ Marx”
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Source: “Reading the
‘unreadable’ Marx,” © Humphrey McQueen 2005, was
written especially for Marx Myths and
Legends.
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Biographical information
Humphrey McQueen is a
freelance historian writing from Canberra.
Humphrey has written numerous
works on the history of colonisation in
Australia, and the development of the Australian
working class and radicalism. His 1970, A
New Britannia, An argument concerning the social
origins of Australian radicalism and
nationalism, has been reprinted numerous
times, including the expanded edition published
by University of Queensland in 2004.
Humphrey is an active
participant in radical political struggles in
Australia today and continues to write and
publish on a wide variety of topics.
See also: Humphrey McQueen’s Home Page |