Marx-Engels Correspondence 1852
Source: MECW Volume 39, p. 175;
First published: in Der Briefwechsel zwischen F. Engels and K. Marx, 1913.
Dear Engels,
From the enclosed pissabed letter from the great Weydemeyer, you will see how matters stand. With it the brute sent 10 copies [of the 18th Brumaire].
I have not yet had an answer from Mr F. Streit ce qui est de très mauvais augure. There is now some, if little, prospect of its being published in English by a London bookseller. For the time being I am to give him the first chapter by way of a sample. I have therefore had it translated by Pieper. The translation is swarming with mistakes and omissions. However, its correction will not be such an imposition on you as the boring task of translation. I would like you to write an English preface of not more than 10 lines, saying that this paper originally appeared in the form of newspaper articles between the end of December and the beginning of February, that it was published as a pamphlet in New York on 1 May, that a 2nd edition is now to appear in Germany, and that it was the first anti-Bonaparte paper to appear; the few details no longer of relevance may be accounted for by its date of origin.
E. Jones is a thoroughly egotistical rascal. For 2 months he has been dangling before me the promise that he will do a translation (for his Journal). For my part, I have done him nothing but favours. In spite of my own money bothers I have spent days with him traipsing all over the place in connection with his paper’s financial affairs. All the foreign intelligence exclusive to his pauvre little paper came from me. Whenever he got into a scrape with his committees, opponents, etc., he came running to me, and my advice invariably got him out of it. Finally, when his journal became altogether too deplorable, I gave him my editorial support for several weeks, and indeed the wretched thing gained some 100 additional subscribers in London.
He, for his part, does not even observe the common civilities. Help him concoct his journal today and he'll forget to send you a copy tomorrow, but this forgetfulness recurs every seven days since his paper does not come out twice a week.
I have told him it’s all very well to be an egotist but he should be so in a civilised way and not so inanely. Since, however, the paper is the only Chartist organ, I shall not break with him but let him shift for himself for a few weeks.
Your
K. M.