Curated playlist
Marxist theorists
- Bertolt BrechtBertolt Brecht left a U.S. congressional hearing in 1947 and flew to Europe the next morning.
- Che GuevaraChe Guevara signed Cuba's paper money with just one word: "Che." He was then president of the National Bank.
- Karl MarxKarl Marx left an estate valued at just 250 pounds when he died in 1883. He died stateless in London at 64.
- Herbert MarcuseHerbert Marcuse analyzed Nazi ideology for American spies before students made him a hero.
- Friedrich EngelsFriedrich Engels rode with an aristocratic fox hunt while funding Karl Marx.
- Vladimir LeninLenin's name came from no person, and the N in N. Lenin stood for nothing. One theory points to the Lena River.
- Theodor W. AdornoTheodor W. Adorno opened his first lecture of the summer semester in 1969 by inviting students to ask questions whenever they arose. A student wrote on the blackboard: "If Adorno is left in peace, capitalism will never cease." Three women…
- Frantz FanonAt 17, Frantz Fanon slipped out of Martinique during a family wedding to join the Allies.
- Karl KautskyLenin once called Karl Kautsky's book the "New Testament" of Marxism. Later, Lenin branded him a renegade.
- Leon TrotskyLeon Trotsky escaped Siberia hidden in a load of hay. He later built the Red Army.
- Louis AlthusserLouis Althusser used a police officer's shout on the street to explain how ideology shapes every person.
- Rosa LuxemburgRosa Luxemburg was killed in 1919 under a socialist government.
- Raymond WilliamsA teenage visit to a Soviet pavilion in Paris led Raymond Williams to read Karl Marx.
- Erich FrommErich Fromm argued that falling in love is not love at all. His 1956 book The Art of Loving became a bestseller.
- Wilhelm ReichIn 1956, a United States court ordered six tons of Wilhelm Reich's books and papers burned.
- Richard D. WolffRichard D. Wolff's father was a lawyer in Cologne, but his degree was worthless in America.
- Rudolf HilferdingRudolf Hilferding refused to escape Vichy France because he had no identity papers and would not leave illegally.
- Slavoj ŽižekSlavoj Žižek is a Slovenian philosopher whom one admirer called the Elvis of cultural theory and whom another label dubbed the most dangerous philosopher in the West. He was born on the 21st of March 1949 and has written over 50 books. He…