When Karl Marx arrived in Paris in 1843, having just married his sweetheart Jenny von Westphalen, he was already becoming notorious throughout Europe as a polemicist and trouble-maker. He had recently been expelled from Prussia for publishing scurrilous articles in his newspaper. But his economic and political ideas were still in their infancy.

During this period Paris was bubbling with intellectual and revolutionary activity; teeming with exiles from across Europe, the French capital had a double life as the international centre of communism. It was in Paris that Marx met the poet Heinrich Heine and, more significantly, was to befriend Engels, who would become his closest and most important collaborator.

It was Paris where he met and conversed with radicalized artisans and would write what is now known as The Paris Manuscripts, the basis of Das Kapital.

Interviewees for the programme include Lesley Chamberlain, Bob Sutcliffe and Francis Wheen, and from France, Stathis Kouvelakis, Jack Altman and Jean Louis Lacascade.

Content last updated: 24/10/2005