Capital: The Third Volume

Author: Translated by the Translation Bureau of the Works of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin, Central Committee of the Communist Party of China
Publisher:
Publishing Time: Not available
Features: I have finally presented to the readers the third volume of the main works of Marx, the concluding part of the theoretical section. When the second volume was published in 1885, I had thought that the difficulties of the third volume would be mostly technical, of course, with some extremely important chapters being exceptions. In fact, this was the case; but at that time, I did not expect that these important chapters would cause me so much trouble, nor did I anticipate that other obstacles would delay the publication of this book so severely. The primary and main obstacle to my work was the long-term decline in my eyesight, so for many years, I had to limit my writing time to a minimum, and even now, writing under the light is only a rare occurrence. Additionally, there were other unavoidable tasks, such as the re-publication and translation of our previous works by Marx and myself, which often required corrections, prefaces, supplements, etc., and these tasks could not be carried out without new research. First and foremost is the English edition, for which I was responsible for the final review, so it occupied a significant amount of my time. Anyone who pays even slight attention to the tremendous growth of international socialist literature in the last decade, especially the number of translations of the works of Marx and those before him, will agree with the following view: I am fortunate to be able to assist translators in only a limited number of languages, and thus I am also responsible for reviewing their work in only a limited number of languages. However, the increase in literature is merely a symbol of the corresponding development of the international workers' movement itself. And the development of the international workers' movement has given me new responsibilities. Since the days when we began our open activities, the work of liaison between socialists and workers in various countries and their movements at home has mostly fallen upon Marx and myself; this work has increased accordingly with the growth of the entire movement. But before Marx's death, he bore the main responsibility for this work, and after his death, this ever-increasing workload fell solely upon me. However, during this period, direct communication between workers' parties in different countries has become the norm, and it is a blessing that this is becoming increasingly so. Nevertheless, from the perspective of my theoretical work, people still demand too much of my assistance. But anyone who, like me, has been engaged in this movement for over fifty years, will consider the tasks arising from it as an unavoidable and immediate obligation. In our turbulent age, like the sixteenth century, in the realm of public interest, there are only theorists on the side of reactionaries; precisely because of this, these gentlemen are not true theorists at all, but merely defenders of reactionaries. I live in London, and my party contacts are mainly made through correspondence in winter and mostly through face-to-face meetings in summer. For this reason, and because I must keep an eye on the development of the movement in an ever-increasing number of countries and the rapid growth of its press, all indispensable work has to be done in winter, especially in the first three months of the year. When one reaches the age of seventy, the myelinated fibers in the brain work so slowly that it is annoyingly difficult to overcome the effects of interruptions in difficult theoretical work. Therefore, if a winter's work is not completed, a large part of it has to be redone the following winter. This is particularly true for the fifth and most difficult part. The reader will learn from the following description that the editorial work of this volume is entirely different from that of the second volume. The third volume has only one draft and is extremely incomplete. The beginning of each chapter is usually written with considerable care, and even the wording is often polished. But as one progresses, the manuscript becomes increasingly draft-like, incomplete, and digresses into peripheral issues that arose during the research process and whose final placement is to be determined later. The sentences also become longer and more complex because they are written according to the thoughts that emerged at the time. In many places, the handwriting and narrative clearly show that the author's illness, caused by overwork, had flared up and worsened gradually; this condition first made it increasingly difficult for him to work alone and later often rendered his work completely infeasible. This is not surprising. Between 1863 and 1867, Marx had not only completed the first drafts of the last two volumes of Capital and prepared the volume for printing but had also done a great deal of work for the founding and expansion of the International Working Association. However, as a result of this, his illness manifested serious symptoms in 1864 and 1865, preventing him from personally completing the second and third volumes. My first task was to dictate the entire manuscript in accordance with the original text and produce a legible copy; even the original text of this manuscript often required considerable effort from me to decipher. This task consumed a significant amount of time. Only after completing the copy could I begin the actual editorial work. I limited this editing to necessary scope. Where the meaning was clear, I always tried to preserve the nature of the original draft. In places where there was repetition, I did not strike it out, because, as Marx usually did, the same issue was discussed from different angles or at least explained in different ways. Where my revisions or additions went beyond the scope of simple editing, or where I had to use the practical material provided by Marx, even if I drew conclusions in the spirit of Marx myself, I enclosed them in square brackets (braces in this volume, as per the editor's note) and added my initials. The footnotes I added sometimes did not use brackets; but wherever my initials appear at the end of a footnote, the entire note is entirely my responsibility.