Horkheimer's Letters with Korsch (1938-1939)
Their plans for the "dialectic": on problems in politics & positivism.
Plans for the “Dialectic” (Korsch).
[Excerpt from: Korsch to Horkheimer, 8/31/1938.]1
… I’m sad that we weren’t able to speak in person about the planned collaboration in re, viz. the “Dialektik,” either in beautiful Glacier National Park or in Chicago, and I am looking forward to when we meet—perhaps at the end of September?—in New York. In the meantime, I will send you the Spain-work2 we discussed for the Zeitschrift, and have just bought a good modern French-English dictionary for translating the French quotations and excerpts perfectly. We (Hedda, Barbara, and I) are hitting the road tomorrow in the old Ford (1929!) that Sibylle let us use for the rest of the month while she traveled to Puerto Rico with her husband after completing her M.A. with highest honors—so, to suddenly interrupt the construction of this sentence, our daughter has lent us her car. We’re driving around quite happily and to great success, as Hedda surprised me on the journey through Iowa with her newly acquired license and driving skills—and tomorrow, as I’ve mentioned previously, we’re going to visit some friends in New Hampshire who live by the sea for 23 days. Perhaps I’ll be able to finish this little piece of work there posthaste. In any event, I'll make sure to send it in by the 10th—that was the “deadline,”3 wasn't it? Much more exciting, of course, is your suggested Schrift über “Dialektik.”
You wrote to me about a “brochure”; I think it must be a whole book. We both have so much to say about it, I alone have a immense amount of 1/2, 3/4 or 9/10 finished notes, aphorisms and sketches on the main theoretical points; one can only convince "its (the dialectic’s) cultured despisers" [if] one goes beyond mere hints and actually executes it; all this has already been a part of our oral discussions. On the other hand, I also understand the advantages of short, theses-like formulations, but the difficulties which come with this approach seem tremendous, the misunderstandings inevitable, and it would be to no ones advantage if we were forced into later apologetics out of necessity, and more precise explanations because of the vagueness of formulas previously issued.
I will leave the rest for later, but direct your attention to what is, in my estimation, an outstanding work by A. Pannekoek, just published in July, 1938, unfortunately only in hectograph, in German, and under a pseudonym indecipherable by outsiders. Whenever you can, make sure you read the full 112 pages of:
J. Harper: Lenin als Philosoph. herausgegeben von J. Meijers. Chasséestr. 11. Amsterdam W.4
—which, despite some (largely insignificant) one-sidedness, is certainly the best work available on the subject thus far. It’s also an excellent starting-point, particularly for natural-scientific, or rather nature-philosophical, questions, which Pannekoek takes up as his central concern (less because his standpoint requires this or because he’s an astronomer than because of the occasion for his book: a confrontation with Lenin’s work). This makes the Pannekoek all the more suitable for the new brochure (or book?) we might write to work out the social-scientific aspects of it all (also, for Pannekoek, the more important and decisive)! Pannekoek’s writing stands apart by its great clarity and simplicity as well. Pity it’s so inaccessible. I believe you will also find the ZfS should act quickly, if possible in the next issue; if you feel like writing a review, or perhaps something more, that would probably be the most effective tack. If you have no time for this in the near future, but, after a quick survey of the text, agree with my estimation of its importance, I may be able to prepare something for you in short order as I have already studied the text in-depth, the scope to be determined by you.5
Politics and Positivism 1 (Korsch).
[Excerpt from: Korsch to Horkheimer, 9/13/1938.]6
I have enclosed the first of the two reviews for the ZfS;7 in size, it is exactly 100 lines in length. It was hard to say everything I felt important under such conditions. On the one hand, I would have liked to say more about some of Pannekoek’s strong remarks, such as the footnote on page 13 about Kantian things-in-themselves, for instance. On the other, I might have said, by way of critique, that Pannekoek unnecessarily limited himself to just one of the three phases of Lenin’s philosophical development. But this critical remark can be omitted, since Pannekoek’s conclusions would not have been changed if he took into account Lenin’s later praise of a “materialistic application of Hegel’s dialectic” (1914-1915). This was, after all, just the reverse side of Lenin’s prior, bourgeois-materialistic standpoint. But hopefully we will soon have a chance to discuss all of these questions in person.
Now for the 300 lines of the Spain-review.8 The restrictions on length will make for even greater difficulties here, since longer excerpts from the report, still unavailable in English, were intended for inclusion in the review. 100 more lines wouldn’t have made this easy, but might have made their inclusion more possible. Nevertheless, I believe I will find a satisfactory solution and should in any event send the manuscript over in time for the deadline on the 20th. I hope I will have more luck this time in my renewed attempt to collaborate on the Zeitschrift than I did last time.9 After all of our discussions, I am basically convinced that the preconditions for this are definitely present.
… I am still waiting with some apprehensiveness for news about my book,10 which, according to the last communication I received from Chapman & Hall, should be published ‘in September,’ at least the English edition and hopefully also the American printing will be published in parallel (by Wiley & Son, New York). I hope I’ll be able to bring you a copy of this Schwergeburt myself in New York. Perhaps I will also introduce some order to the German ur-text, which is really more important to me than the English translation, which, despite all of my efforts, is still not the same quality. … One final thing: while reading Pannekoek and the literature related to it, I was thinking a lot more about the confrontation over fundamental principles [grundsätzliche Auseinandersetzung] which might emerge from our planned Dialektik-Studien between Marx’s materialism and the modern positivism of Mach and Avenarius to Carnap and co.
Politics and Positivism 2 (Korsch).
[Excerpt from: Korsch to Horkheimer, 2/8/1939.]11
… Yesterday, before I left Boston, I sent a letter to Lix [ed.: Felix Weil] with something enclosed for you. … The article [viz., “State and Counter-Revolution” (1939)]12 is about one of the prospective topics of our collaboration. In the course of writing the article, it became clear to me just how much work has yet to be done on the subject, and just how much material and preliminary results I already have in the work I’ve done between 1933 and 1934. I believe I could tackle the object of inquiry more comprehensively and incisively than Silone has in his dialogue about dictators, which is an eminent work in its own right (and in its poetic form).13 After all, what an incredible distance there is between Silone’s dialogue, notwithstanding its few advances, and the dialogues of Hobbes (1660-64)14 and de Maistre (ca. 1800-05)!15 (For now, I’ll say no more about the latter.)
Now for the second matter. I actually wanted to arrive on February 1st and spend 4 weeks here (after making the necessary arrangements with Carnap) to study the presuppositions and limitations of logistics with Carnap and Bertrand Russell—in whose seminars I intend to conduct my own experiments by posing uncomfortable social-scientific questions!—for my lectures of March 2nd-3rd at the Institute.
… There is nothing else to report; for, as you know, the world is in enough trouble already. All the same, I am anxious to hear whether the Anarchists in Valencia will or won’t attempt a last-ditch effort of resistance after the capitulation of the Azaña-Negrin Government.16 True enough, they would shed quite a lot of blood in defeat which they might save if they surrendered without a fight. —But now I see that the working class must completely empty the cup; none of its organizations or ideologies until this point may be spared. …
Politics and Positivism 3 (Korsch).
[Excerpt from: Korsch to Horkheimer, 2/19/1939.]17
… I received the Zeitschrift today, and I must congratulate you once again on a brilliant article—”The Philosophy of Absolute Concentration,” which hits the whole movement “right on the Marck.” It was also an aesthetic pleasure to read in print. It’s just a shame that it has to be in the same issue as Schlesinger’s report,18 which might have some instructional value in terms of content but is simply fascistic in spirit (with a few choice “Marckistic”-liberal ingredients sprinkled in, very appropriate to the prevailing line of thought over there!). At least it has none of the mutilations—”sei” instead of “ist,” etc.—which my article, unfortunately, suffered at Löwenthal’s hands. Thus on page 471, towards the end of the first paragraph, where I had written that only in exceptional cases of abandoned capitalist enterprises was there “still a trembling creature to whom the generous workers could grant life and freedom” [“noch eine zitternde Kreatur fand, der die großmütigen Arbeiter Leben und Freiheit lassen konnten”], Löwenthal only ‘grants’ me the privilege of saying it was an exceptional event if the workers ever “granted life and freedom” [“Leben und Freiheit ließen”] to anyone.
Schlesinger on the other hand speaks on page 391 of shootings under the charming name of “political discrediting,” and only the most careful of readers would be able to infer from the use of the word “war” [“was”] in footnote 2 on page 389 (penultimate line) that the energetic young scholar Pashukanis, notwithstanding all of his “self-criticism,” is in fact no longer “ein von Pokrowsky wesensverschiedener Typ ist” [“of a kind essentially different from Pokrowsky”]19 but only “war” [“was”].20 But enough of this.
Second, I would like to extend my thanks for the Soirées de St. Petersbourg. During my exhausting work with my pure forms, I would occasionally cast a longing glance at them and I’m already excited for the day, the first in 23 weeks, I’ll finally be able to work through this wealth of interesting and characteristic thoughts.
Third, … , I confirm that my lecture (and and with it Philipp Frank’s) (1) will be postponed from March 2-3 to 9-10 and (2) will be held in German. Preparing it in the latter has been quite disruptive to my general development and even somewhat confusing, on account of the abundance of symbols and technical expressions across two languages (and which, in fact, frequently change internal to each, aside from whatever general distinctions there are between the languages). But I can appreciate the objective reasons for holding the discussion in German for this group. I think (subject to later changes, of course) that I will simply speak of “Die Mängel des naturwissenschaftlichen Materialismus (Positivismus, logischer Empirismus)” [“The Deficiencies of Natural-Scientific Materialism (Positivism, Logical Empiricism)”].
I need not bring up old chestnuts from 1920, but will only speak of what is, in fact, the best, strongest, and most contemporary among the positions which have been achieved by the movement [of natural-scientific materialism], and also of their shortcomings with regards to social-scientific use. I will put together some examples, but after Frank has finished speaking, in the time between speakers, I will try as much as possible to build off his claims and examples so that some kind of real connection can be established. I would be grateful if you, too, at some point in the debate, would briefly and antithetically formulate what you consider most important from your articles (and those of others) on the subject. Further, I think it would be highly advisable to have a good stenographer on hand taking notes on all of the lectures and discussions. Because really, we will all give lectures different than the ones we’ve prepared, and which may have their greatest impact through a successful clarification of distinctions in standpoint.
Critical Notes on Korsch’s “State and Counter-Revolution” (Horkheimer).
[Excerpt from: Horkheimer to Korsch, 3/4/1939.]21
We can discuss the contents of your letter, such as your criticism of the Schlesinger essay, once you’ve arrived. I doubt you will still maintain it is “simply fascist” in spirit. On the other hand, I freely confess to some unpleasantness in reading it as well. I read your recent article with great interest.22 I need not tell you that from my perspective too, these problems are among the most crucial concerns for theory in the present. In reading your lines I experienced a feeling similar to the one I had during our recent conversations, in which we often came back to these questions, and even an old conversation of ours many years ago in Berlin. You say the origin of the movement’s degeneration is to be found in the theory itself, and you identify “Jacobinism” as one of the decisive factors. You do make it clear that your focus is primarily on the theory of the state, the relation between economics and politics. However, I confess I am completely unable to determine exactly what is truly important for you. From your point of view, in theory as much as in practice, the political is probably overestimated relative to the economic, and forms of government relative to forces of the masses. But with these vague indications, I still feel as if I’m on thin ice. If you were to answer that one really ought to feel insecure about such delicate questions, I would have to reply: you are certainly correct. My reservation, however, is not about the problems you raise but your intention and, since in the end you draw rather strong conclusions from your conception, one gets the impression you are either not revealing what is most crucial to understand the subject or that you think the reader too stupid to pick up on what you hold to be self-evident. Precisely because your own theoretical standpoint is so difficult to identify, your attack on contemporary theory and practice is at risk of being misconstrued as mere scolding. Further analysis of the errors of 1851, or even a more precise expression of the internal ground of its necessity, could throw quite a bit of light on the whole matter. But, as you now present it, the argument does not strike me as a strong one. I have the feeling you have something of immense import to say about this point. This is precisely why I would urge you to articulate this. Already since your last visit, I have made some forays in this direction, and I need you to help me sharpen them. …
In: Max Horkheimer, Gesammelte Schriften. Band 16 (1995), 467-470. Author’s translation.
“die besprochene Spanien-Arbeit”: Karl Korsch, [Review] “Collectivisations.” In: ZfS, Vol. 7, No. 3 (1938), 469-474.
A review of:
Collectivizations. L'oeuvre constructive de la Revolution Espagnole. Receuil de documents. By the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (Spain). Editions C. N. T. — F. A.I., 1937, 244 pages.
The full review was published as a study in two parts in English in Living Marxism:
Part 1:
Vol. IV, No. 3, May 1938, under the title “Economics and Politics in Revolutionary Spain” (transcribed for marxists.org by Zdravo Saveski) [link]: https://www.marxists.org/archive/korsch/1938/economics-politics-spain.htm
Part 2:
Vol. IV, No. 6, April 1939, pp. 178-182., under the title “Collectivization in Spain” (1939) (transcribed for marxists.org by Adam Burton) [link]: https://www.marxists.org/archive/korsch/1939/collectivization.htm
For further reading, see:
Piccone, Paul. “Korsch in Spain.” New German Critique, no. 6 (1975): 148–63. https://doi.org/10.2307/487659. (PDF through Libcom.org) [link]: https://libcom.org/article/karl-korsch-spain-paul-piccone
English in original.
[MHGS Ed. Fn.:] Anton Pannekoek, Lenin als Philosoph, published in 1938 as Bd. I of the Bibliothek der “Rätekorrespondenz”; in print, published in English under the title Lenin as Philosopher, ed. Paul Mattick, 1948.
PDF through Libcom.org [link], html. format on marxists.org: https://www.marxists.org/archive/pannekoe/1938/lenin/index.htm
[MHGS Ed Fn.:] A review of Pannekoek's book did not appear in the ZfS. Korsch's review ‘Lenin's Philosophy — Some additional remarks to J. Harper's recent criticism of Lenin's book Materialism and Empirio-Criticism’ appeared, signed with “e.h.,” in the journal Living Marxism, edited by Mattick, Nov. 1938, pp. 138 ff.
Available as html. through marxists.org [link]: https://www.marxists.org/archive/korsch/1938/lenin-philosophy.htm
In: MHGS, Bd. 16 (1995), 481-483. Author’s translation.
Of Pannekoek’s Lenin als Philosoph (see above).
The review of Collectivisations (see above).
[MHGS Ed Fn.:] Twelve reviews appears in the first three years of the ZfS (1932-34) by Korsch.
[MHGS Ed. Fn.:] Korsch, Karl Marx, London and New York (1938).
In: MHGS, Bd. 16 (1995), 553-555. Author’s translation.
Korsch, “State and Counter-Revolution”, in: Modern Quarterly, Winter, 1939, Vol. XI, No. 2, pp. 60 ff.]
Available in html. through marxists.org [link]: https://www.marxists.org/archive/korsch/1939/state-counterrevolution.htm
[Korsch] seems to mean “Dialogue Between a Philosopher and a Student of the Common-Laws of England” that appeared in 1670.
In late 1938, Horkheimer was engaged in writing a report on de Maistre’s Soirées de St. Petersbourg. Cf. Horkheimer to K.v. Hirsch, 11/17/1938. In: MHGS, Bd. 16 (1995), 507-508.
[MHGS Ed. Fn.:] From 1936 to 1939, Valencia was the seat of the left-wing Spanish republican government under President Manuel Azaña y Díez (1880-1940) and Prime Minister Juan Negrin (1889-1956).
In: MHGS, Bd. 16 (1995), 526-564. Author’s translation.
Rudolf Schlesinger, ‘Neue sowjetrussische Literatur zur Sozialforschung I: Juristisch-ökonomische Diskussionen,’ in: ZfS VII (1938), S. 38 f.
[MHGS Ed. Fn.:] Mikhail Nikolayevich Pokrovsky (1868-1932), Soviet Russian historian and sociologist, in 1918 Deputy Commissar for Public Education in the Soviet Union and head of the State Central Archives.
Evgeny Bronislavovich Pashukanis (1891-1937), executed in Stalin’s purges in 1937 after being accused of plotting against the Soviet state, was forced to write a number of self-criticisms before his execution despite the fact these only fueled the accusations against him.
In: MHGS, Bd. 16 (1995), 569-570. Author’s translation.
See footnote No. 12, above.