Friedrich Engels
Friedrich Engels (/ˈɛŋɡəlz/ ENG-gəlz;[2][3][4] German: [ˈfʁiːdʁɪç ˈʔɛŋl̩s]; 28 November 1820 – 5 August 1895) was a German philosopher, political theorist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He was also a businessman and Karl Marx's closest friend and collaborator, serving as a leading authority on Marxism.
"Engels" redirects here. For other uses, see Engels (disambiguation).
Friedrich Engels
5 August 1895 (aged 74)
- Communist Correspondence Committee (until 1847)
- Communist League (1847–1852)
- International Workingmen's Association (1864–1872)
Gymnasium zu Elberfeld
(withdrew)[1]
University of Berlin
(no degree)[1]
Mary Burns (died 1863)
Alienation and exploitation of the worker, dialectical materialism, historical materialism, false consciousness
Engels, the son of a wealthy textile manufacturer, met Marx in 1844. They jointly authored works including The Holy Family (1844), The German Ideology (written 1846), and The Communist Manifesto (1848), and worked as political organisers and activists in the Communist League and First International. Engels also supported Marx financially for much of his life, enabling him to continue writing after he moved to London in 1849. After Marx's death in 1883, Engels compiled Volumes II and III of his Das Kapital (1885 and 1894).
Engels wrote eclectic works of his own, including The Condition of the Working Class in England (1845), Anti-Dühring (1878), Dialectics of Nature (1878–1882), The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884), and Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy (1886). His writings on materialism, idealism, and dialectics supplied Marxism with an ontological and metaphysical foundation.
