Introduction

April 1867: Marx has finished writing Book I of Capital and travels to Hamburg to take the manuscript to the publisher himself. In a letter dated the 17th to his friend Johann Philipp Becker, a militant of the I° Internationale, he informs him of the purpose of this trip and asks him to announce the forthcoming publication of his book in the press: “It is without question the most terrible missile that has yet been hurled at the heads of the bourgeoisie (landowners included).”