Karl Marx: A biography by David McLellan

3 i8 3 I 8 KARL MARX: A BIOGRAPHY

of great natural intellect, much vivacity, deeply interested in the revol-

utionary movement, and of an aristocratic laissez-aller very superior to the

pedantic grimaces of professional femmes d'espritThere were visits to

the theatre and the ballet (which bored Marx to death) and a dinner in

Marx's honour where he was placed between the countess and the niece

of Varnhagen von Ense. 'This Fraulein', he wrote to Antoinette Philips,

'is the most ugly creature I ever saw in my life, a nastily Jewish physiog-

nomy, a sharply protruding thin nose, eternally smiling and grinning,

always speaking poetical prose, playing at false enthusiasm, and spitting

at her auditory during the trances of her ecstasis."'^7 Marx did, however,

manage to persuade the countess to start a press campaign against Blan-

qui's ill-treatment by the French police. The visit was prolonged since

Marx was applying, with Lassalle's active assistance, for the recovery of

his Prussian citizenship and the bureaucracy moved slowly. But Marx

began to tire of Berlin society very quickly: 'I am treated as a sort of

lion and compelled to meet many professionally "intellectual" ladies and

gentleman.'^98 He found the whole of Berlin engulfed in ennui: bickering

with the police and the antipathy between civil and military authorities

constituted the the sum of Berlin politics. Marx attended a session in the

Prussian Chamber of Deputies and found it 'a curious mixture of bureau-

cracy and the school room';^99 there was a general spirit of dissolution in

the city: people of every rank thought a catastrophe inevitable and the

next elections would yield a parliament in opposition to the King.

In these circumstances, Marx considered the time ripe for the foun-

dation of a new paper, but he and Lassalle could not agree upon terms.

Lassalle insisted that if Engels joined the editorial board in addition to

himself and Marx, then Marx and Engels should have only one vote

against his own. But, although Lassalle was supplying the money, Marx

considered that he could only supply a useful service if he were kept

'under strong discipline'. He wrote to Engels:

Dazzled by the reputation that he has gained in certain learned circles

through his 'Heraclitus' and in another circle of spongers through wine

and cuisine, Lassalle is naturally unaware that he is discredited in the

public at large. There is also his dogmatism, his obsession with

the 'speculative concept' (the fellow even dreams of his writing a new

Hegelian philosophy, raised to the second power), his infection with

old French liberalism, his arrogant pen, importunity, tacdessness, etc.^100

In the end, Marx left Berlin without receiving his Prussian nationality (in
spite of a personal interview with the Prussian Chief of Police, again
arranged by Lassalle) and without a definite decision one way or another
on the paper. Marx at least had the satisfaction of finding his old friend