Highgate Cemetery – Karl MARX

Amani and Safwat...
planning the route :)

On Tuesday, we visited Highgate cemetery, one where many a rich and famous are buried, most famously the father of Communism as we know it, Karl Marx. It was a beautiful day, one which we were extremely grateful of as the cemetery did seem extremely creepy at times, and the fact that it was listed as haunted on Google maps (hehe) did not help either. I think it is rather amazing, as none of us even knew that such influential and interesting historical and modern figures were buried there, in the very city we live in, and it does make me think....if only these people who live right outside the gates of the cemetery knew of the lives of these individuals. Walking around the grounds we came across many different graves, and of people from many different ethnicity, political standings and religions. It truly is a place full of colourful history and very different stories from people of various ideological backgrounds , and we look forward to enlightening you and ourselves as we research and write about specific individuals.

Highgate Cemetery contains the grave of Karl Marx himself. Yet it is highly ironic that it costs around £4 to enter the part of the cemetery in which his grave lies, as an anti-capitalist himself. This fact alone has angered Marxist all around the world, who see it as form of disregard of Marx’ work to demand a part of visitors capital in order to even enter and visit.

The original grave of Karl Marx

Karl Marx was born in 1818 in Germany to a Jewish father, and studied philosophy and law, and was a follower of Hegel who was a renowned German philosopher. In 1842 he became the editor for a German liberal democratic newspaper, Rheinische Zeitung. However, this position was short lived as the Prussian officials shut down the newspaper for being too outspoken, leading to Marx’s move to Paris, where he adopted communism and befriended Friedrich Engels, a fellow countryman who shared all views. After being exiled from France, Engels and Marx both moved to Brussels and worked on developing their communist philosophy. The pair then relocated to London in 1847 to join forces with a group of revolutionary German workers, creating the Communist League.

Marx's home in London 
on Dean Street

Perhaps Marx's most famous achievement is his co-authoring of ‘The Communist Manifesto’ together with his lifelong  friend Friedrich Engels in 1848, which was published in London. The publication outlines the main goals of Communism, and the main theory behind the workings of the movement. By explaining the theory, both Marx and Engels explain how a revolution is necessary, and will occur, leading to the abolishing of private property and the disappearance of class distinctions. It explains how a revolution is inevitable due to the failure of the survival of a capitalist society.

“Let the ruling classes tremble at a Communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win. Workingmen of all countries unite!”

― Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto

Amani and Safwat getting a close
look at the grave

       'The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways. The point however is to change that'

Although Marx did not live to see the effects his manifesto had on the world and had little immediate effect, by 1950 almost half the world's population was living under Communist governments. During his lifetime, there were outbreaks of revolutions which started in France after the banning of socialist meetings following the  manifestos release, and they spread across Europe, yet the revolutions were crushed almost as soon as they started. Yet, 23 years after Marx’s death in 1917, Vladimir Lenin began and executed the first ever successful communist revolution in Russia.

“Anybody who knows anything of history knows that great social changes are impossible without the feminine ferment. Social progress can be measured exactly by the social position of the fair sex .”

― Karl Marx

This quote is a translation of Marx’s letter to Louis Kugelmann, who was a German gynecologist, social democratic activist, and confidant of Marx and Engels. The quote shows how Communism supports and works towards equality for all, not just between the classes, but also the abolition of gender distinctions and discriminations. It may also explain the voting patterns of most women over the years, as many research has shown that women are more likely to vote for more left wing and socialist contenders, and shows how perhaps the current capitalist climate across the Western democracies is unaccomodating to the gender equality movement due to its misogynistic nature and the degree of male dominance within it. Therefore, it is possible to suggest that women's position in society will definitely be more equal to that of men in a perfect communist society rather that one revolving around capitalism. However, i think history has proved that due to human nature, it is simply impossible to create a working Communist society as Marx and Engels perhaps envisioned while writing the Communist Manifesto.

Have a read of the Communist Manifesto yourself:

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/download/pdf/Manifesto.pdf