Explain the bookclub: We are reading Volumes 1, 2, and 3 in one year and discussing it in weekly threads. (Volume IV, often published under the title Theories of Surplus Value, will not be included in this particular reading club, but comrades are encouraged to do other solo and collaborative reading.) This bookclub will repeat yearly.

I'll post the readings at the start of each week and @mention anybody interested. Let me know if you want to be added or removed.

Just joining us? You can use the archives below to help you reading up to where the group is. There is another reading group on a different schedule at https://lemmygrad.ml/c/genzhou (federated at !genzhou@lemmygrad.ml ) which may fit your schedule better. The idea is for the bookclub to repeat annually, so there's always next year.

Archives: Week 1 – Week 2 – Week 3 – Week 4 – Week 5 – Week 6 – Week 7 – Week 8 – Week 9 – Week 10 – Week 11 – Week 12 – Week 13 – Week 14 – Week 15 – Week 16 – Week 17 – Week 18 – Week 19 – Week 20 – Week 21 – Week 22 – Week 23 – Week 24 – Week 25 – Week 26 – Week 27 – Week 28 – Week 29 – Week 30 – Week 31 – Week 32 – Week 33 – Week 34 – Week 35 – Week 36 – Week 37 – Week 38 – Week 39 – Week 40 – Week 41 – Week 42 – Week 43 – Week 44 – Week 45 – Week 46 – Week 47 – Week 48 – Week 49 – Week 50 – Week 51

Week 52 – From Volume III, Chapter 51, Chapter 52, and Engels' supplement

Chapter 51 is called 'Distribution Relations and Production Relations'

Chapter 52 is called 'Classes'

Then Engels' supplement has two parts, called 'The Law of Value and Rate of Profit' and 'The Stock Exchange'

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894-c3/index.htm

Discuss the week's reading in the comments

  • 666PeaceKeepaGirl [any, she/her]
    ·
    20 days ago

    Finished with about 8 hours in the year to spare!

    I definitely got a lot out of this. I'd previously read excerpts from Vol. I for a class, and while that was definitely a good first taste, I think it's really important for actual understanding to have the broader perspective of Marx's argument that requires actually going and reading all the way through rather than trying to pick out isolated and decontextualized bits of understanding.

    I'm a little sad I wasn't able to participate in the group more, I was constantly a few weeks behind pretty much the entire year - whenever I was just about caught up I'd either get really busy, or Marx would start talking about some particular misunderstanding of Adam Smith's for 50 pages causing my eyes to glaze over. I'm hoping I can maybe skim back over it along with next year's group so that I can contribute some to discussion.

    The occasional dry Adam Smith passage aside, Marx is actually a really engaging and (mostly) surprisingly clear writer. I could only manage maybe 10 pages an hour most of the time, but despite the pace it never really feels like just a textbook. What Marx does especially well (and what I think doesn't come through unless you read him on his own terms) is that he encourages the process of critical thinking in his readers. It's a testament I think to his strength as a writer that I often found myself getting lost in thought digesting the implications of a particular development and at times anticipating the direction of the argument pages or even chapters ahead.

    Overall, 10/10 great book great experience would recommend