I was in Trier, Germany last week, famous for.. among other things, being the birth place of Marx.
I found the store filled with Marx merchandise amusing:
The “opium of the people” quote was only available on a magnet in German, not in English (other quotes were available in English), I’m assuming a conscious choice based on potential interest.
I couldn’t resist getting a copy of the poster that has the entire Communist Manifesto written on it with an image of Marx and Engels coming through from the text thanks to manipulation of the formatting.
I also got a postcard with a cartoon of Marx and the following quote: “Tut mir leid Jungs! War halt nur so ‘ne Idee for mir…”, which Babelfish completely butchers in its translation so I’ll try, but feel free to correct me: “Sorry kids! ‘Twas just an idea I had.”
Boarding a plane to Budapest later in the day added a twist to all this for me. While I can see friends and colleagues in the U.S. understanding why I would’ve picked up those items, I don’t think too many people in the town where I grew up would get why I’d want anything with Marx on my walls.
{ 29 comments }
GreatZamfir 12.04.07 at 11:25 am
Communist-themed merchandise is a remarkably persistent phenonemon, at least in the former West. A few years ago there was a sort of fashion rage to wear Soviet sports shirts, i.e. pure red with bold white CCCP lettering on the front. On top of the irony of commercial fashionization of communism there was the strange effect that many young people thought CCCP was a brand name like any other.
I don’t know why this stays so popular. I suppose communism has been discredited enough to make it funny, while not having an evil enough image to make it too shocking. With a bit of nostalgia added about the days there was at least an alternative to our society, if not a perfect one, and perhaps also some glee in using the former opponents’ icons in the superficial, commercial way it would have hated the most. Plus a yearly inflow of 16-year olds who seriously believe, if only for a while.
I suppose the former East has its own complicated relationship with the old Communist symbols, and mutual understanding is difficult. I guess in Germany it will be a long time before everyone is on the same track again.
abb1 12.04.07 at 11:48 am
How about: “All I know is I’m not a Marxist.” That’s a real quote and it’s better than “just an idea I had”.
Southern Beale 12.04.07 at 12:08 pm
Commercialization of Communism? Help, I’m stuck in irony hell!
Back in the early ’80s I went to the Soviet Union and bought tons of what I call “Commie Camp.” Still have some of it: Lenin lapel pins, stuff like that. The best things were the posters, those cheesy propaganda posters. They were in Russian so I had no idea what they said but from the pictures it looked like stuff like “Workers Are Teh Awesomest.”
My big regret is that I didn’t save any of them. I gave them away to friends and the one or two I kept got shredded over the years of hanging on my dorm walls. They were really colorful and while they might not be worth anything today since they made tons of the things, they’re certainly not making them anymore.
Jacob Christensen 12.04.07 at 12:18 pm
Running the “Tut mir leid, Jungs…” through Babelfish gives this:
The full “Opium for the people”-quote goes like this:
(Zur Kritik der Hegelschen Rechtsphilosophie. Einleitung, 378)
I wonder – cf. an earlier post – how that will work as a pick-up line on a late Saturday night?
Matt 12.04.07 at 1:04 pm
_Communist-themed merchandise is a remarkably persistent phenonemon, at least in the former West._
It’s pretty popular in Russia, too, and not just w/ the tourists.
GreatZamfir 12.04.07 at 1:22 pm
It’s pretty popular in Russia, too, and not just w/ the tourists.
I guess their viewpoint is different again from that of their former satellite states. A bit more ‘former glory days’, a bit less ‘sign of the oppression’, perhaps? But then again, it appears to me that central Europeans do not 100% equate communism with ‘Russian oppression’.
nu 12.04.07 at 2:57 pm
A few years ago there was a sort of fashion rage to wear Soviet sports shirts, i.e. pure red with bold white CCCP lettering on the front. On top of the irony of commercial fashionization of communism there was the strange effect that many young people thought CCCP was a brand name like any other.
That trend didn’t have that much to do with communism. vintage or pseudo-vintage soccer jerseys were in style. all of them. people were wearing brasil 70’s t-shirt, the 1984 France jersey, old mexican gear from the 70 World Cup, Germany 74 shirts etc..
Sk 12.04.07 at 3:02 pm
You should get a Che shirt, too.
Murderous psychopaths are all the rage!
Sk
Matt 12.04.07 at 3:07 pm
Was Marx a “murderous psychopath”, SK? Whom did he murder? What were his marks of being “psychopathic”? Or are you just full of shit?
atlas 12.04.07 at 3:10 pm
perhaps some glee in using the former opponents’ icons in the superficial, commercial way it would have hated the most.
There was a similar phenom in the southern US. The confederate flag was rebranded with neon African colors and marketed at black rebels. I can’t recall the brand but it experienced limited success.
Regarding the communist posters, this blog posts one each day, with translation.
http://sovietposter.blogspot.com/
Peter 12.04.07 at 4:58 pm
Even more bizarre was being able to buy official memorabilia of the Communist Party of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics from the reception desk at Leon Trotsky’s House in Mexico City. That was in 1998. I guess they needed to sell something to recoup their costs . . .
JoXn 12.04.07 at 5:36 pm
“Sorry, ’bout that, guys! It was just a thought…”
Sk 12.04.07 at 6:07 pm
“Even more bizarre was being able to buy official memorabilia of the Communist Party of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics from the reception desk at Leon Trotsky’s House in Mexico City. That was in 1998. I guess they needed to sell something to recoup their costs . . .”
Not much of a demand for ice picks in Mexico City, I suppose…
Sk
goatchowder 12.04.07 at 6:18 pm
Aber bicklecker nicht mein sofa, sofa.
Eszter 12.05.07 at 12:06 am
Thanks for the Soviet poster link, Atlas, that’s a neat resource.
I remember (just barely) some really great posters and slogans. After all, artistic/graphical talent existed under those conditions as well so they were put to such use.
nick s 12.05.07 at 1:48 am
The Lev Yashin goalie shirt, in particular, is a triumph of minimalism. Though the tedious ongoing discussion of ‘why Commie chic? why no Nazi chic?’ will apparently never be settled by reference to design principles. You’d think that the deriders of Commie chic would be sufficiently gleeful at its commodification.
gmoke 12.05.07 at 6:04 am
Not Marxist but definitely Hungarian and possibly right up your alley, from Bruce Sterling and the Doors of Perception folks:
http://www.score-network.org
KITCHEN BUDAPEST
Kitchen Budapest, a new media lab, which opened in June, is doing fascinating work: a robot lawnmower that reproduces photographic images on the landscape; (((okay, hold everything: who the hell can’t like a photographic lawnmower))) an intelligent autonomous raft that’s still floating down the Danube; a local network for displaying local videos; and a web 2 platform called GETS that that enables local level service exchange. Three months on, their first catalogue is already online and and is also available upon request in printed form. Kitchen also have residency openings for such programmes as “Pimp My Gadget” for next year. Kitchen has to be one of Europe’s liveliest labs.
http://www.kitchenbudapest.hu/hu/2007summerpdf
LANDLINES
bad Jim 12.05.07 at 9:15 am
I once had a poster, from the S.F. Cost Plus, featuring a monster out of the Apocalypse, entitled “Literacy is the Path to Communism.” (Back somewhen it may have been commonly assumed that literacy and communism were both good things.)
A couple of years ago I took a tour of Highgate Cemetery. I was pleased to note that the tomb of Marx was engraved with my favorite quote: “The philosophers have tried to interpret the world in several ways. The point, however, is to change it.”
I was even more gratified to find a German version of this, in an intricate spherical sculpture near the train station in Potsdam, on the way to Sans Souci.
abb1 12.05.07 at 9:36 am
…my favorite quote: “The philosophers have tried to interpret the world in several ways. The point, however, is to change it.â€
It was used as a slogan in the USSR; what’s so good about it? I always disliked it, the hubris of it.
Doug 12.05.07 at 9:38 am
2: “I guess in Germany it will be a long time before everyone is on the same track again.”
You say that like it’s a bad thing…
a very public sociologist 12.05.07 at 3:48 pm
I do love radical chic, but then I’ve got the politics to fit :P
Peter 12.05.07 at 8:23 pm
#18 cites: “Literacy is the Path to Communism.â€
This is certainly understood in some societies. The elite of Mende society in Sierra Leone used literacy (in Arabic) as a strategic political weapon, and restricted access to literacy education in order to maintain their political power.
John Quiggin 12.05.07 at 8:53 pm
I’d never heard of this museum until I read Eszter’s post, but then it was mentioned by a colleague at dinner last night (in Cairns, North Queensland!), and I quoted the postcard. CT is the path to cultural capital, I guess.
Dr. Minorka 12.06.07 at 12:08 am
“I don’t think too many people in the town where I grew up would get why I’d want anything with Marx on my walls.”
I’m not sure. Times are changing. There is a widespread feeling that the post-1989 system has failed, too. Next general strike: December 17. The electoral support of the governing Socialist Party (self-reliance, privatizing the health care, and in general everything what is left from the pre-1989 times, etc.) has practically disappeared. The right-wing opposition (strongly opposing the privatization) could receive twice as many votes as the socialists if elections were held today.
bad Jim 12.06.07 at 8:34 am
abb1, I’m partial to the quote partly for its brassiness but mostly because it’s a capsule definition of pragmatism, or a variety of it: instead of speculating about something, perform an experiment.
Harold 12.06.07 at 3:26 pm
A few summers ago, we went to the Marx museum in Trier. We were not tempted at all by the shirt with the slogan: “The philosophers have tried to interpret the world. The point, however, is to change it.â€
In fact it is all too easy to change the world — for the worse — the point is to understand it.
When we came home I read somewhere that this is in fact a mistranslation and that Marx’s original meaning was not quite so stupid. I think he meant something along the lines: “the point is to understand the world in order to change it.”
Slogans do lend themselvesto stupidity, though. The last thing the world needs is more anti-intellectualism. I preferred the French slogan of 1968 — “less action, more talk.” (But not “no action, only talk.” — perhaps it should be “Less slogans, more thought!”)
Bought a mug.
That museum put us off going to any more German history museums for a while. It was unbelievably dull.
Trier is very nice. Especially the Roman antiquities. It was a hugely important outpost of the Roman Empire.
abb1 12.06.07 at 4:09 pm
Bad Jim, if you like brassiness here’s a good one by Lenin: “Marx’s teaching is all-powerful, because it is correct.”
eszter 12.06.07 at 11:04 pm
CT is the path to cultural capital, I guess.
John, you only figured this out now?:)
Harold, yes, I enjoyed the Roman remains quite a bit as well.
bad Jim 12.07.07 at 9:21 am
We’re all talking past each other. We can’t exist without changing the world, with every breath we take, every cake we bake, every lobster we take for a stroll.
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