DannyB

Paris Manuscripts

It was as if a scrap of paper was found in the street. One of those anonymous streets that lead through a time-space warp and into a fragment of the city that is both imagined and real. A door opens, tumble through, a dusty corridor, it’s airless and stale, there is someone in the cornerContinue reading “Paris Manuscripts”

The train to Paris, a city of Capital

There’s a crowd of people slowly moving toward platform 7 and the 13.31 train to Paris. I become aware of a young woman and man in close proximity. Why them? There are plenty of other people within a few inches or so. And yet no one bumps another and if they accidently do, they generallyContinue reading “The train to Paris, a city of Capital”

Tractors, Marx and Sowing Seeds

A woman in a trim blue padded coat stopped and asked if she could help. Blond hair blew in whisps across her face. She was all smiles and sparkly eyes. I was standing at a road junction near the railway station at Shepherdswell studying an Ordnance Survey map. I looked at her over the topContinue reading “Tractors, Marx and Sowing Seeds”

When Marx went to Morrisons…

…Hegel came too In the film The Million Pound Note Gregory Peck plays the character of the American sailor Henry Adams. He has been blown off course in his schooner, picked up in the Atlantic and ends up in London penniless. Two eccentric brothers, Oliver and Roderick Montpelier see him in the street (he isContinue reading “When Marx went to Morrisons…”

In the beginning was the commodity

The question is raised as to why Marx starts Capital with the ‘commodity’. It’s right there in the first line of the first chapter of the first volume: “The wealth of societies dominated by the capitalist mode of production appears in the form of an ‘enormous accumulation of commodities’ “. Why did Marx start withContinue reading “In the beginning was the commodity”

(Night) train to Antwerpen

The most unlikely places create stimulation. Stepping out into Kings Cross from a train that’s just arrived from the coast. Into the middle of a world city. The train ran up from east Kent and the Channel could be seen alongside the track. Grey and steel-like, container ships and tankers and bulk carriers in theContinue reading “(Night) train to Antwerpen”

Visions of Marx….endlessly

The only part of Capital to be published in Marx’s lifetime was volume one. It first came into being in Hamburg in 1867. Throughout the book Marx confidently asserts that ‘more of this will appear in volume two’, ‘this argument will continue in volume three’ and so on. But those later volumes were not finalisedContinue reading “Visions of Marx….endlessly”

eye massage

Once a year I go to hospital to have my eyes photographed. There is a growth behind one of them and if it changes, then as I understand the procedure, my eye gets taken out of its socket, the growth removed and the eye put back in it’s proper place. It’s always good news toContinue reading “eye massage”

Reading Capital in a Supermarket

The more Marx is bought to earth, the more fascinating his ideas become. By earth, I mean the local area in which I live. If Marx is relevant to this somewhat shabby and run down urban area then his ideas can be scaled up to a global level. Marx had a lot of theories andContinue reading “Reading Capital in a Supermarket”

Reading Capital in the London Road

A new edition of the first volume of Marx’s Capital, translated by Paul Reitter has arrived. It’s a handsome book made with good quality paper, hard cloth covers and a bold dust jacket. It’s been laying on top of a huge illustrated catalogue of the Louvre in Paris. Perhaps by some mystical osmosis the ghostContinue reading “Reading Capital in the London Road”