Laura Marx

Marx, Laura 

(married name, Lafargue). Born Sept. 26, 1845, in Brussels; died Nov. 25, 1911, in Paris. Active in the French socialist and working-class movement. Daughter of Karl Marx and the wife and comrade of P. Lafargue.

After her marriage in 1868, Laura Marx settled in Paris with her husband, where she helped disseminate the ideas of the First International in France. Upon the fall of the Paris Commune of 1871, the Lafargues emigrated to Spain and in 1872 to Great Britain. When the Communards were amnestied in 1880, she returned to France with her husband and became active in the Workers’ Party, founded in 1879, and an exponent of Marxism. She translated many of Marx and Engels’ principal works into French, including the Communist Manifesto and Ludwig Feuerbach, and assisted in the publication of their other works. She wrote for socialist periodicals, helped organize strikes (for example, the dye workers’ strike in Amiens in 1893), and worked in the trade union movement. She took part in the preparations for the founding congress of the Second International in 1889 and welcomed the Russian Revolution of 1905-07, writing that Russia had entered a new era. Shortly before their deaths the Lafargues became acquainted with V. I. Lenin and N. K. Krupskaia.

REFERENCE

Vorob’eva, O. B., and I. M. Sinel’nikova. Docheri Marksa, 4th ed. Moscow, 1967.