Reading Group for Karl Marx's CAPITAL VOL I

[Buffalo Souljah]

Hi everybody,

I am just beginning what appears to be a life-long effort of self-betterment and learning. Along the path, I've discovered some veritable gems in literature, philosophy and theory, among which, though not an exhaustive list, have been Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, Nietzsche's On the Genealogy of Morals, Georg Lukacs's History & Class Consciousness and Kierkegaard's Philosophical Fragments. I have recently taken up the task of reading Marx and discussing Marx with friends and have, through various means, wound up with an etext version of Capita from marxists.org. I'm reading through Volume One at a casual pace, and would like some travelling companions! Would anyone like to set up a discussion/reading group for the first volume (maybe we can eventually move on to the other two, that might be fun as well)? I find the material enlightening and reading this text has dramatically altered the way I see political economy and society in general. I would love to bring in David Harvey's talks and other outside material to enrich the experience, and think this might be a worthy piece of literature for anyone interested in dialectics, materialism or labor theories of value to pick up. The reading is rich and interesting and I needn't defend it. Anyone interested?

[Buffalo Souljah]

I don't know how much I can stress the beauty and lucidity of this text. It's really a worthwhile read for anyone interested in the nature of the capitalist system of production or in labor in general. Come on, guys!

[Manifesto]

I might join you but this book is ridiculously long and theres only two weeks of break but if I can tolerate it. BTW you should skip the first three chapters from what I've heard, have you gotten far yet?

[Buffalo Souljah]

I'm just starting the seventh chapter, The Labor Process and the Production of Surplus Value. I've read the book from the beginning and have to admit, the first two chapters can get a bit redundant; but chapter three contains some fundamental principles on money and the nature of money in circulation, so I would recommend at least reading it.

From the third chapter:

In its qualitative aspect, or formally considered, money has no bounds to its efficacy, i.e., it is the universal representative of material wealth, because it is directly convertible into any other commodity. But, at the same time, every actual sum of money is limited in amount, and, therefore, as a means of purchasing, has only a limited efficacy. This antagonism between the quantitative limits of money and its qualitative boundlessness, continually acts as a spur to the hoarder in his Sisyphus-like labour of accumulating. is with him as it is with a conqueror who sees in every new country annexed, only a new boundary.If you feel you thoroughly understand money and its relation to the process of circulation, sure, skip those chapters, but I advise you to at least skim the third chapter, to understand fully what Marx is getting at when he starts talking about capital, surplus-value, labor-power and all the other categories that spring up later in the text. He starts talking very early on about the commodity form, so if you're not sure what its limits and substance are, then I would advise you to go back to the first two chapters. Just dip into the text and see what you get out of it. Are you aware that Marxists.org has a full e-text version (in case you want to mark up an HTML version and put it in your FTP server space, like I'm doing). The link is here (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/). Happy reading.

Just pick through the text and maybe try browsing David Harvey's discussions on the text (http://davidharvey.org/reading-capital/), and see what questions or main points pop up to you. For instance, my concerns early on (reading chapters one, two and three) were the interrelation (and antinomies) between abstract and concrete labor, and how value is produced, some of which were answered in reading further-- I found out that abstract labor becomes such after losing its qualitative distinctions and thereby becoming "general" (quantitative) in nature, and thereby becoming comparable quantitatively. Accordingly, value is calculated out of the socially necessary labor time (a term Marx continually returns to) required to produce a particular commodity. So then you get to exchange value, which is how different products of abstract labor are made commensurable with one another, and which is not necessarily dependent upon the value (price) of a good but of its use value. So, a quart of strawberries may be worth more to you than a baseball cap because it more immediately satisfies a need or a desire you have, so you're willing to pay more for it, so the strawberries would have more exchange value than the baseball cap.He then gets to surplus value and labor power, which I'm now reading about and have a general idea of the nature of. Let me know if you have questions, and maybe I can recommend some literature.

You said you only had two weeks to read? May I make a humble suggestion? Though not generally as comprehensive, Laszek Kolakowski's Main Currents of Marxism (http://books.wwnorton.com/books/detail.aspx?ID=8147) Vol. 1 offers a thorough account of the material of Capital and you should check into reading it instead, considering your time limit--which is actually a theme Marx brings up later in the guise of the working day. This is phenomenal stuff and should be required reading for everyone! BTW, if you find K.'s text (try a university library, or, alternately, your public library if you have an extensive socialist literary collection), chapters XII-XIII (pp. 262-334) contain insight on Capital.

Cheers, mate.

[Red Saxon]

It took me a stupid amount of time to find Das Kapital in the ePub format, but luckily with Google Books I managed to grab a download.

I'll be reading it over the next week, since I have nothing better to do.

[Buffalo Souljah]

It took me a stupid amount of time to find Das Kapital in the ePub format, but luckily with Google Books I managed to grab a download.

I'll be reading it over the next week, since I have nothing better to do.

Marxists.org (http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1867-c1/) has a plain text version that I find more accessible than the Google Books version. I would recommend it instead. Happy reading.

jnw

[Drace]

I'm interested in reading it.
I tried to do so alone before, but failed to understand anything...

[Buffalo Souljah]

I've started a group. Here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/group.php?groupid=324) is a link. I've started discussions on the first chapter and on David Harvey's coursework for Capital.

j.n.w.

[Sean]

I've started a group. Here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/group.php?groupid=324) is a link. I've started discussions on the first chapter and on David Harvey's coursework for Capital.

j.n.w.
I suggested making little subforums for the major communist works in learning a while ago. I'll certainly join having struggled through it by myself it would get great to have company.:)

[Buffalo Souljah]

I suggested making little subforums for the major communist works in learning a while ago. I'll certainly join having struggled through it by myself it would get great to have company.:)

That woud be a good idea. Maybe we can look into that. Let's start with Capital first though. I've set up the group and added some threads. We can work as we go along. This will make for great holiday reading. You'll be surprised how literary a man Marx can be. Happy reading!

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

I have to admit i'm thoroughly intrigued by Capital. I've tried reading it before but, like Drace, just couldn't process such a vast amount of heavy information by myself.

I'm just not sure that I can devote enough time at the moment to this work. At some point in the coming months, though, i'd love to read the work and perhaps the Harvey discussion of it, and perhaps raise some questions within the confines of a reading group. So perhaps you will be hearing from me soon:)