Weitling, Wilhelm.

8vo (193 x 125mm.), half-title, modern red straight-grained morocco

rare first edition. Wilhelm Weitling (1808-1871) was the leading figure of pre-Marxian German communism and its first proletarian leader. A tailor by trade, he travelled through Germany and France agitating for socialism before migrating to England, where he was welcomed by the community of émigré German socialists. The present work, described as “brilliant” by Marx before he fell out with Weitling, is one of three in which he laid out his vision of socialism. Engels described him as “the only German socialist who has actually done anything”.