One of the things that I think often doesn’t register when people are approaching Marx, is that there is no standard “social science genre” when he’s writing – and critique is often being expressed via parody and satire, in what would now be regarded as “literary” forms. So when working out a style for expressing the sorts of points he was making in Capital, it’s no less intuitive to reach for parody than for positivism…

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(1) they are more sensitive to Marx’s Hegelian language than many other interpretations – which enhances the sense that Marx is engaging with Hegel quite a lot (although, from my point of view, most of these authors still do miss – or at least don’t find it worthwhile to thematise – many of Marx’s Hegelianisms, which I find much more frequent in the text than you’d gather from most other commentaries)

(2) at the same time, they assume that, if Marx is using Hegelian vocabulary, he must be using this vocabulary in earnest – so you get interpretations of Marx’s method that leave it completely unclear how critical he is of Hegel, and also – I think – often end up hypostatising elements of capitalist production, so that it’s very unclear how you’d get an actual practical critique (since Hegelianised interpretations of Marx tend to make things seem overwhelming in an ontological sense, rather than just, say, overwhelming because there are real problems with hard power).

From my perspective, when Marx uses Hegelian vocabulary, he’s often taking the piss – either out of Hegel, or out of someone else. Hegelianisms in Capital are very frequently sarcastic. This doesn’t get recognised because, on the one hand, a lot of interpreters don’t want Marx to be like Hegel, and so they disregard or denigrate the Hegelianisms (or just don’t know enough Hegel to recognise when Marx is using them) or, on the other hand, interpreters recognise the Hegelianisms, and therefore want to take them literally – as though the only reason for Marx to be using Hegelian vocabulary would be because he’s endorsing a Hegelian sentiment.

My approach is instead to try to recognise when Marx is using Hegelian vocabulary – but then to consider the possibility that Marx isn’t using this vocabulary in an entirely serious way – which isn’t to say Marx isn’t making a serious point when he uses this vocabulary. It’s just that the serious point is often that this vocabulary is a bit ridiculous, and that it tends to mask the extent to which the production of capital is a contingent phenomenon that we can analyse with tools far more secular and deflationary than those applied by many forms of theory and philosophy…

It was good to hear your presentation at the conference, and to have the opportunity to meet and talk with you. I must say I’ve never heard anyone else identify the jokes in Capital and discuss their meaning and serious significance!

I’m not sure I took all of it in at the time of your presentation, but look forward to mulling over it when I get to read your thesis, and the book when published.

I also found your highlighting Marx’s distinction between his method of investigation and method of presentation important. One of the things it prompted me to think about was the relationship between his method of presentation in Capital ch.1, and his confession of “coquetting” with Hegelian terminology in “the chapter on value”. I don’t know what you think about that…

As you know, I’m especially interested in Marx’s critique of the Hegelian dialectic and Marx’s own version insofar as it appears in Capital. As my own views on these topics are at this stage rather tentative, I’m very interested to see what you make of all that in the thesis and book.

Thanks and cheers,

Paul.