Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe

MEGA volumes in a library.

Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe (MEGA) is the largest collection of the writing of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in any language. It is an ongoing project intended to produce a critical edition of the complete works of Marx and Engels that reproduces the extant writings of both authors in books of high-quality paper and library binding.

Being a scholarly and academic, historical-critical (historisch-kritische) edition, most MEGA volumes consist of separate text and appendix books, the latter giving additional information on the edited text.[1] All material in MEGA is edited in the original language, resulting in mostly German- but also a considerable quantity of English- as well as French-language texts.

Initiated by the Institutes of Marxism–Leninism of the SED in Berlin and the CPSU in Moscow and published by Dietz Verlag (Berlin) as a series launched in 1975, MEGA contains all works published by Marx and Engels in their lifetimes and numerous previously unpublished manuscripts and letters.[1]

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, publishing of MEGA was transferred to the Internationale Marx-Engels-Stiftung (IMES) in Amsterdam.[2] The volumes are printed and bound by Walter de Gruyter in Berlin.[3] The project is presently being overseen by Gerald Hubmann.[4]

Sixty-five volumes of MEGA have been published so far.[5] All volumes containing writings related to Das Kapital have been published. Most recently a text volume and accompanying apparatus volume containing Marx's ecological writings was published. The entire project is expected to be 114 volumes in total.[5]

  1. ^ a b Rojahn, Jürgen (1998): Publishing Marx and Engels after 1989: The fate of the MEGA.
  2. ^ International Institute of Social History: Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe.
  3. ^ Walter de Gruyter: Marx, Karl / Engels, Friedrich: Gesamtausgabe (MEGA).
  4. ^ Buck, Tobias (June 15, 2018). "Plan to publish full works of Marx is long time in the making". The Financial Times. Archived from the original on June 15, 2018. Retrieved June 17, 2018.
  5. ^ a b marxforschung.de: Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe (MEGA²) (German).

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