Picture of author.

Friedrich Engels (1820–1895)

Author of The Communist Manifesto

279+ Works 29,594 Members 239 Reviews 22 Favorited

About the Author

Friedrich Engels is perhaps best remembered as the confidant, colleague, and benefactor of Karl Marx. Engels was born into a Calvinist family on November 28, 1820. The family owned fabric mills in the Rhineland and had business interests in Manchester, England, Engels joined the family business at show more age 16; he never had a formal university education. Despite his family's industrial background, Engels was sympathetic to the poverty of the working masses. At age 18 he published an attack on industrial poverty, and later joined the Hegelian movement that so influenced Marx and bothered conservative Prussian authorities. Engels first met Marx in 1842, while Marx was editor of a radical newspaper in Cologne. However, they did not establish their lifelong friendship until they met again in Paris two years later. Engels published several works related to economics, the first of which, Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy (1844), attempted to reconcile Hegelian philosophy with the principles of political economy. His second book, The Condition of the Working Class in England (1845), was a damning description and condemnation of the poverty generated by the Industrial Revolution. Engels also co-authored three major works with Marx, the most important being the Communist Manifesto (1948). Engels also wrote several historical works, which are more important to historians than to economists. These include The Peasant War in Germany (1850), Germany: Revolution and Counter-Revolution (1851), and The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884). In general, these works are more descriptive than theoretical, and they closely parallel Marx's views on industrialization and class struggle. In addition to being a friend of Marx, Engels was his prime benefactor for a number of years. During their early years in London, beginning in 1849, the Marx family was nearly destitute, and it was only through the generosity of Engels that they prevailed. Engels was also responsible for the publication of Marx's Das Kapital. Before his death, Marx was only able to complete the first volume of this work, and so Engels edited and arranged for the publication of the last two volumes after Marx's death. Engels was an engaging and thoughtful writer. It was perhaps his great fortune and misfortune that he was connected so closely to Marx. On the one hand, he was responsible for bringing much of Marx's work to fruition in his role as benefactor and editor. On the other hand, the shadow of Marx eclipsed some of the exposure that Engels's own ideas and contributions might have had. Engels died of throat cancer in London, 1895. Following cremation at Woking Crematorium, his ashes were scattered off Beachy Head, near Eastbourne as he had requested. (Bowker Author Biography) Friedrich Engels, German political economist, was born in what is now known as Wuppertal, in 1820. From 1842 to 1844 Engels worked in a textile mill in Manchester, England. During this time Engels theorized that all of the social unrest and worker discontent he encountered were the direct result of private ownership of property. He concluded that social ills could be eliminated only through a class struggle culminating in the end of private ownership and the establishment of a communistic form of government. The publication of his Condition of the Working Class (1844) reiterated his philosophy and his conclusions about an inevitable class struggle. Friedrich Engels first met Karl Marx in 1842. When they met again in Paris in 1844, the two men discovered they had a great similarity of views and decided to work together. They delineated the principles of communism, later known as Marxism, and their work resulted in the founding of an international communistic movement. The Communist Manifesto, penned by Marx, was based in part on a draft Engels prepared. It became renowned as the classic exposition of modern communism, and it had a profound influence upon all subsequent literature dealing with communism. Marx and Engels' partnership lasted until Marx's death in 1883. Engels carried on his work by editing the second and third volumes of Marx's Das Kapital. Friedrich Engels died in 1895. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: Friedrich Engels (1820-1895) 1856 photograph

Series

Works by Friedrich Engels

The Communist Manifesto (1848) 14,990 copies
The Marx-Engels Reader (1972) 2,855 copies
The German Ideology, including Theses on Feuerbach (1932) — Author — 719 copies
The Civil War in France: The Paris Commune (1871) — Author; Foreword, some editions — 467 copies
On Religion (1957) — Author — 257 copies
Dialectics of Nature (1940) 215 copies
Selected Works (1958) 172 copies
Der deutsche Bauernkrieg (1966) — Author — 164 copies
On Literature and Art (1947) 110 copies
The Housing Question (1930) 96 copies
The Principles of Communism (1847) 90 copies
The Essential Left (1960) 72 copies
Engels on Capital (1937) 70 copies
On Colonialism (1965) 63 copies
Anti-Dühring / Dialectics of Nature (1962) — Author — 33 copies
Articles on Britain (1775) 33 copies
Selected Writings (1967) 24 copies
Selected Works, Vol. 2 (1976) 14 copies
Revolución en España (1939) 12 copies
O socialismo jurídico (2012) 12 copies
The Wages System (1977) 11 copies
On Marx (1975) 11 copies
The British Labor Movement (1934) 11 copies
Ten Classics of Marxism (1940) 9 copies
Oeuvres, tome 2 (1966) 9 copies
On Communist Society (1975) 7 copies
Les utopistes (1999) 6 copies
Riassunto del «Capitale». La forma di valore (1997) — Author — 6 copies
Ausgewählte Werke (1988) 6 copies
Critica dell'anarchismo (1972) 6 copies
The Socialist Revolution (1978) 5 copies
On Authority 5 copies
The American Journalism of Marx & Engels (1966) — Author — 5 copies
Marx-Engels i kamp (1972) — Author — 5 copies
Anti-Schelling 4 copies
Principes du communisme (2020) 4 copies
Über Kultur, Ästhetik, Literatur (1973) — Author — 4 copies
Om feodalismen (1972) 3 copies
Über Ludwig Feuerbach (1972) — Author — 2 copies
Correspondence 2 copies
El socialismo (1976) 2 copies
Filosofiske skrifter (1974) 2 copies
Textos 2 copies
Socialism 1 copy
De la autoridad (2004) 1 copy
Die Armee (1956) 1 copy
Temas militares (1975) 1 copy
Auf Reisen 1 copy
1: 1868-1886 1 copy
Kadin ve Aile (2000) 1 copy

Associated Works

Das Kapital (1861) — Editor, some editions — 1,667 copies
Capital, Vol. 2: A Critique of Political Economy (1885) — Editor — 1,144 copies
The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte (1852) — Introduction, some editions — 887 copies
Capital, Vol. 3: A Critique of Political Economy (1894) — Editor — 868 copies
The Poverty of Philosophy (1847) — Preface, some editions — 488 copies
Das Kapital, Gateway Edition (Skeptical Reader) (1987) — Editor — 361 copies
The Varieties of History: From Voltaire to the Present (1956) — Contributor — 327 copies
The Essential Feminist Reader (2007) — Contributor — 316 copies
Anthropological Theory: An Introductory History (1996) — Contributor — 205 copies
Western Philosophy: An Anthology (1996) — Author, some editions — 184 copies
The Portable Victorian Reader (1972) — Contributor — 176 copies
The Utopia Reader (1999) — Contributor — 111 copies
Taking Sides: Clashing Views in Business Ethics and Society (1990) — Contributor, some editions — 72 copies
Mary Barton [Norton Critical Edition] (2008) — Contributor — 69 copies
The Woman Question (1951) — Author — 68 copies
Reader in Marxist Philosophy (1963) — Contributor — 61 copies
Classics of Modern Political Theory : Machiavelli to Mill (1996) — Contributor — 48 copies
The Modern Historiography Reader: Western Sources (2008) — Contributor — 37 copies
Political philosophy (1965) — Contributor — 33 copies
Philosophy now : an introductory reader (1972) — Contributor — 24 copies
Bakoenin : een biografie in tijdsdocumenten (1977) — Contributor — 19 copies
The Classics of Marxism, Volume One (2011) — Contributor — 12 copies
Utopie Eindexamencahier Havo vanaf 2007 (2006) — Contributor — 11 copies
Theories of the Labor Movement (1987) — Contributor — 7 copies

Tagged

19th century (454) anthology (145) anthropology (115) capitalism (398) class (106) classic (111) classics (174) communism (1,540) economics (1,433) economy (156) Engels (236) Europe (80) France (113) German (240) Germany (158) history (1,227) Karl Marx (205) Kindle (84) literature (129) Marx (715) Marxism (2,249) non-fiction (1,584) own (92) philosophy (2,877) political (132) political economy (323) political philosophy (408) political science (423) political theory (478) politics (2,260) read (218) revolution (139) social science (95) social theory (120) socialism (895) sociology (431) theory (303) to-read (1,187) translation (88) unread (108)

Common Knowledge

Members

Discussions

Group read: The Communist Manifesto (1848) in One Book One Thread (June 2021)

Reviews

Not bad for a commie. He seems to guess a bunch, he's a bit homophobic, and his obsession with Marx is weird, but I feel like I know more now than before I read the book
 
Flagged
bookonion | 14 other reviews | Mar 10, 2024 |
Jones does a great job contextualizing the Manifesto beforehand (with a whopping 184-page introduction, not to mention footnotes for the actual text of the Manifesto), and connects the reader to many other philosophers and social theorists in Marx's influential circle. In fact, this edition seems more like a history book than simply another published copy of the Manifesto. As for Marx, his opinions on the harm of capitalism are very well elucidated, but when it comes to his solutions, they are very vague and seem to be merely based on what happened in the French Revolution. His thoughts on capitalism make it all worth it, however, and thus I will move on to his other works, especially [b:Economic & Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844|85954|Economic & Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844|Karl Marx|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1521042866l/85954._SY75_.jpg|82945].… (more)
1 vote
Flagged
stargazerfish0 | 136 other reviews | Jan 13, 2024 |
Not an easy read and definitely not the book I thought it would be. Will have to look for Communism elsewhere.
 
Flagged
MXMLLN | 136 other reviews | Jan 12, 2024 |
One of the single most embarrassing exercises in utterly missing the point. Unparodiable.
 
Flagged
RatGrrrl | Dec 20, 2023 |

Lists

Awards

You May Also Like

Associated Authors

Karl Marx Contributor, Author
Francis B. Randall Introduction
V. I. Lenin Contributor, Author
Vladimir Lenin Introduction
Red Viktor Illustrator
Vincent Galino Penciller
Jürgen Habermas Contributor
Ronald David Laing Contributor
Max Horkheimer Contributor
Aaron Esterson Contributor
Erich Fromm Contributor
Lu Hsun Contributor
Sigmund Freud Contributor
S. Ryazanskaya Editor, Translator
Leon Trotsky Introduction, Contributor
Hal Draper Editor, Contributor
Howard Selsam Contributor
Mao Tse-Tung Contributor
Germano Facetti Cover designer
Slavoj iek Contributor
Wendy Lynne Lee Contributor
Mihailo Marković Contributor
Y. Wagner Contributor
M. Strauss Contributor
Takis Fotopoulos Contributor
Michael Hardt Contributor
Bert Andréas Contributor
Haig A. Bosmajian Contributor
Michael Harrington Contributor
Wal Suchting Contributor
Max Adler Contributor
Joe Bender Contributor
Eduard Bernstein Contributor
Antonio Negri Contributor
Bertram D. Wolfe Contributor
Karl Löwith Contributor
Ernest Mandel Contributor
Lucien Laurat Contributor
Iring Fetscher Editor, Afterword
A. J. P. Taylor Introduction
Killoffer Cover artist
Mark F. Smith Narrator
Marshall Berman Introduction
Mikko Lahtinen Afterword
Jean Bruhat Introduction
W. J. Rees Translator
Samuel Moore Translator
M. Gianassi Translator
Evelyn Reed Introduction
Alick West Translator
M. Granchi Translator
Eric Hobsbawm Introduction
Florence Kelley Translator
C. P Dutt Translator, Editor
Edward Aveling Translator
Edward Gorey Typographer
Sydney Butchkes Cover designer
Clemens Dutt Translator
Richard Dixon Translator
Reinhold Niebuhr Introduction
Vic Schneierson Translator
Marcelo Backes Translator
Paulo Ferreira Leite Cover designer
Antonio Kehl Cover designer
Ernst Wangermann Introduction
J. Cohen Translator
I. B. Lasker Translator
Barbara Ruhemann Translator
Martin Milligan Translator
Dirk J. Struik Translator
Jack Cohen Translator
Alex Miller Translator
Austin Lewis Translator

Statistics

Works
279
Also by
33
Members
29,594
Popularity
#679
Rating
½ 3.7
Reviews
239
ISBNs
1,674
Languages
36
Favorited
22

Charts & Graphs