this post was submitted on 21 Aug 2025
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Reading theory*
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"Yeah, I read the Communist Manifesto one time when I was a teenager. It sounded nice in theory, but b but muh human nature and all that."
My Read Theory, Darn It! introductory Marxist-Leninist reading list, for anyone that wants it! Making some edits to it though.
Some Marxist literature can be difficult to follow to be fair, especially as a lot of the classics are over 100 years old and translated from German or Russian.
I agree, though a lot of it is easier than you'd expect. I also made an intro ML reading list to help ease people into theory, and I'm far from the first to do so!
Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy is pretty easy, good bones, but Marx revises a lot of his views later, by Capital he's abandoned concepts like "Lumpen Proletariat" and the idea that socialism can only be achieved after a capitalist developmental phase.
Socialism: Utopian and Scientific by Engels is one of the best intro Marxist works: comprehensive, practical, and easy to follow.
Wage Labor and Capital is another short and pretty digestible work by Marx that lays out a lot of the economic ideas without a deep dive such as Capital. But "economic Marxism" is kind of its own kind of confusion, and Capital shouldn't be read to understand his economic ideas but his actual methods.
Marx wrote for the workers, not the academy, his works can be difficult but they make more sense as someone trying to learn more to understand about their lived experiences of exploitation, than an academic view that only wishes to compete in an intellectual marketplace, rather than empower the working class to liberate ourselves and each other.
But Marxism isn't a book to be studied or a method to be applied. You can be a Marxist without ever picking up one of his works, I think there are a lot of "organic" Marxists who know through experience but doubt through shame and misinformation. Marx ultimately wanted to teach us to understand material conditions, but without the various distortions that have been introduced by bourgeois philosophers (some of them even considered themselves Marxists!)
Put yourself in touch with people who can get you involved in actual work in your city and community, doing real social work with the people who need supported. You'll get an education from the work and take your time with the written works of Marx and Marxists to let it enrich your actual work, not define your idealistic beliefs.
After all, "The philosophers have only interpreted the world, the point is to change it."
Marxism is the unity of theory with practice, practice without theory turns a blind eye to revolutionary experience and the knowledge gained through past struggle, while theory without practice leads to "Marxologists" that wish to critique society without changing it. There can be good comrades that ignore theory, but they will always stand to gain from reading theory and using it to guide their practice.
Do fully agree about getting organized, that's arguably step 0.
I wouldn't disparage people for anything that brings them to socialism though I def agree, but the question of how theory is practice gets neglected quite often. There's a dialectical relationship between the two, Marxism is what gives us the capability of fully fusing theory with practice, subject with object, individual with the social. We can read theory and commit to practice and learn nothing, accomplish nothing, because we still have the insidious dualist mindset. Everything we learn gets categorized and atomized. We learn words and phrases to signal understanding to others, but understand very little. Feeling accepted is perhaps the first step for the stubborn individual to let go of individualism and embrace socialization, so its natural for new comrades to want to make themselves sound radical, and they should be accepted by cadre and celebrated for their achievements. But of course radical talk and radical action can be quite distinct, and experienced cadre should know how to tell the difference, and challenge comrades to continually improve and fix themselves. I've seen people able to be very inspiring and educated in speeches, but opportunistic reformists in practice. This must not be how comrades develop, this is not self actualization, it is bourgeois affect.
Theoretical study opens up many avenues to understand material conditions, through practical analysis, discussion and criticism. Then, once the actual conditions have been assessed we can take action -- but based on material conditions and not theoretical abstractions. Taking action changes conditions, changing conditions requires more analysis and critique, which may require deeper understanding of theory in order to assess conditions accurately. Once assessed, we act, rinse, repeat. Evaluate and take action, reevaluate, and take another action.
I've seen too many comrades trying to apply the tactics of 1910s Russia to american struggles. They quote Lenin on a particular tactic or strategy, when Lenin was often changing tactics, and rhetoric, in order to most effectively address changing conditions. Too many comrades read Engel's 3 rules of Dialectical Materialism and apply them like an orthodoxy, but have never closely studied Theses on Feuerbach nor unveiled the human spirit that thrives within Marx's works.
So I'm not contradicting you, or I don't mean to, but theory and practice is not necessarily our objective. Marx explicitly called for theory in practice, which means our theory must itself be practical. Theory helps us to see through the illusions, it must not be made into yet another illusion. But IMO therein is the most important benefit of surrounding ourselves with good cadre, they'll call me out on my shit, and help me up when I stumble. Anyone who encourages us to be better, to be more practical, to center the human perspective in our work is following the same spirit as Marx, and it doesn't matter what they've read if they've read anything at all.
But also, its no coincidence that good cadre Marxists are also exceedingly comradely, good natured, fair and fearless. The practice transforms us, so we can transform the world, together.
Sure, my point is that both theory and practice are necessary to be united, each sharpens the other, without the other they are dull or directionless.
Yes its definitely the major pitfall most comrades make. Fortunately, we also have the most comprehensive theory of change! Today, for example, a local leader in our city who we would only have described as a moderate socialist for many years, someone who once told me "i wouldnt read theory i read enough theory books in school" is pitching hard into Marxism, consuming large amounts of theory and history, and making radical demands for radical action. Very interested to see where he will be in like 6 months. Another comrade who once mocked my "ideological" views has become one of my closest cadre comrades. Honest good comrades learn from experience that we Marxists are consistent in our beliefs and fight the most important struggles, time after time, changing everything around us. The time we live in is so dangerous and frightening, and yet the movement is growing rapidly, and sloughing off opportunism and reformism for revolutionary principles. "Decades where nothing happen, weeks where decades happen," hits pretty hard in this period of struggle.
Anyway thanks for letting me dump, I think I'm just eager to get back to an essay I began a couple days ago!
No worries! Good luck on your essay!
Read The Fucking Manifest
I personally like The Principles of Communism more for an intro piece, but the manifesto is always great!
Not trying to diss the Manifesto but I never recommend it to people to read first. Everyone who I've met who isn't a Comrade and only read the Manifesto always walk away saying the same shit about how it's "a great idea but not realistic and there's no real plan" blah blah or they just straight up say it's dumb because it isn't serious.
I think Principles of Communism is great as a real beginner FAQ and Socialism: Utopian and Scientific to dispel most of the "unrealistic" attacks. Stalin's Dialectical and Historical Materialism is even better if they already read analytical works generally.
You have a lot more experience actually creating reading lists and guides though, just sharing what I've noticed.
Yep, fully agreed! I don't even have the manifesto on my intro list, if you've seen it, and I'm debating adding Stalin's Foundations of Leninism, or Dialectical and Historical Materialism. It's going through a bit of a refresh right now.
Nice, good luck with the refresh!
You know, I've never even read Foundations of Leninism. I'm going to put that on my own list. Thanks!
No problem! FoL is a nice refresher, and a great intro IMO, so it's all stuff you likely have already read before but still worthwhile.
Not trying to diss the Manifesto but I never recommend it to people to read first. Everyone who I’ve met who isn’t a Comrade and only read the Manifesto always walk away saying the same shit about how it’s “a great idea but not realistic and there’s no real plan”
I think the reason people say this, when they read the Manifesto, is that it's so fucking dense, that it can be hard to parse. particularly if you're a random lib who has never tried to think dialectically before. So in lieu of grappling with the text and what it's doing (a thing that I think is best done in a reading group setting, especially for new folks), they insert thought terminating cliche's instead.
Oh, I completely agree!
Libs think it's Communism 101 when it's really a distillation of a vast amount of knowledge and experience—and it's a specific call to action for those already deeply involved in the movement—then when they don't immediately understand it they call it unrealistic. The fault is with the perceiver, not the perceived. The Manifesto is great if you understand all the background and context behind it. If they just wander off the street after a lifetime of only reading Harry Potter, then it's no surprise they don't understand it. So, I never recommend it to anyone. Anyone who I think should read it would've already read it by that point.
That being said, Calculus is Satanic black magic and a hoax.
People should read Marx, but this argument is invalid. I think Nazism is evil and I don't think I need to read Mein Kampf to determine that.
It remains true that arguments against Marx are overwhelmingly based on fabrications, or from red scare nonsense. I cannot tell you how many times I still see the mud pie argument despite it being disproven in the opening pages of Capital.
I think you’re spot on, Marx specifically has a lot of connotations the general, uninformed public is terrified of.
I remember when I had to read it for a class the first time and the vibes in the room was exactly like you’re opening some of book of sin. I was scared of a book, as a college student at the time. Then we actually started reading it, and it was like “wow this guy gets the issues of the system”.
While I personally have agreements and some disagreements with Marx, I think he helped give me a lot of solid ideas that the system itself could be reformed and reforged.
I think it’s a shame that his ideas had carried a public taint to them for so long, due to several authoritarians co-opting his message. I have no clue why it’s not required high school reading at this point, since I feel it’d go a long ways towards helping more people get curious about improving and changing the system for the better.
I think you need to do a bit more reading into the history of socialism in the real world if you walked away with the idea that Marxism is "tainted by authoritarians," and not that Marxism has worked in real life, and was demonized by capitalist society for posing an alternative in the real world.
Further, he was also revolutionary, not reformist, though you may have misspoke there.
I think he helped give a lot of solid ideas that the system itself could be reformed and reforged
Bro didn't read the book
What do you mean? A reformed and reforged system is a new system.
I could give you a multi-hour long breakdown of my views but something tells you’re not interested in a long-form dialogue here.
Marxists do not advocate reforming capitalism, but overthrowing it and transitioning to socialism. That's the big thing there.
I think his ideas can reform a capitalist system. It’s probably one of many ways his ideas get off the ground. The big thing was changing the system, it’s not necessarily all about how you get there.
At a fundamental level, class struggle and the theory of the state means the working class must overwhelm the capitalist class, and this cannot be done within the framework of existing, bourgeois society. That's why all lasting socialist states have come through revolution.
The problem is that a capitalist system will not allow itself to be reformed in this way, as the "reforms" that Marx poses are antithetical to the very foundation of capitalism.
To give some accessible examples; you can't house homeless people or give people healthcare and higher education because homelessness and debt is a whip to keep the workers working for whatever wage and conditions are offered by a capital owner. You can't deconstruct racism because it was invented in the first place to keep the working class at war with itself rather than struggling against the conditions set by the ruling class. You can't stop imperialism because infinite growth requires infinite and unrestricted expansion into new territories.
The system of capitalism manufactures its own required conditions through cruelty and social inequality (and yet, it's these very things that lead to resistance), and without those necessary components the whole system collapses. The ruling class will not allow this to happen, because this system serves their material interests, and thus fundamental change cannot happen until the working class; whose material interests are directly opposed to those of the ruling class; is in power. The ruling class will pay lip service and the occasional half-measure in order to obscure this reality and make "reformism" seem possible, but 1) that is all they will do especially in the absence of a real threat to their power and 2) they will always eventually claw back even the smallest and hardest-fought of crumbs. Crumbs are good and all but there comes a point where our energy is better spent fighting for the whole cake.
I think it’s a shame that his ideas had carried a public taint to them for so long, due to several authoritarians co-opting his message
While we might point to some Socialist experiments that succumbed to needless authoritarianism (for example, Romania), This is a view that looks at 20th century socialism, and collapses the experiences of these places. Just the former eastern bloc, for instance, is far more diverse, socially, and politically, than westerners often caricature it as.
The aforementioned example of Romania, with its horrific treatment of women, vs the comparatively very modern East Germany with its state-owned gay bars are in many respects, world apart. Collapsing these places with a blanket term of "authoritarian" and waving it away as all just an unfortunate shame, is unhelpful at best, and actively anti-intellectual at worst.
You should unironically read Mein Kampf though, at least once. And a few other Fascist things, like The Coming American Fascism, anything by Aleksandr Dugin, and some good ol’ Fascist esoterica (Julian Evola is a good place to start), and so on.
You can never know and understand too much. Like, what Fascists think, how they come to believe and defend their conclusions, and so on.
Because they’re running things right now.
You should unironically read Mein Kampf though, at least once
The funny thing about that book is if you tell a neo-Nazi you've read it and have a criticism, they'll immediately ask which translation and claim most of them are a "Jewish trick".
Olivier Mannoni, who translated the 2021 French critical edition, said about the original German text that it was "An incoherent soup, one could become half-mad translating it", and said that previous translations had corrected the language, giving the false impression that Hitler was a "cultured man" with "coherent and grammatically correct reasoning". He added "To me, making this text elegant is a crime." [snip]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mein_Kampf#Criticism_by_translators
previous translations had corrected the language, giving the false impression that Hitler was a “cultured man” with “coherent and gramatically correct reasoning”.
Very interesting. That’s exactly what the media (even the traditional “liberal” media) does with Trump’s ramblings.
Today we call that “sane-washing.” And yes, it is a crime against humanity, and one we don’t complain about nearly enough.
Anyway, apparently I need to look into which translation I read.
Evola is kinda fun, for how utterly batshit he was. He called himself a Super-Fascist, and would go on walks during bombing raids to, "test his fate". Like, buddy, your fate could be a lot different of you stayed the fuck inside?!
The bombs didn't kill him, sadly.
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