“Confessions” were semi-jocular questionaires that were very popular in Victorian England, and filling them out a common passtime in many families, including Marx’s, where friends and relatives particpated. A number of versions of Confessions belonging to Marx have been preserved.
In the Spring of 1865 Marx stayed with his uncle, Lion Philips in Zalt Bommel (Holland), and his answers to the Confession he completed here is shown in the middle column below. His daughter Jenny kept an album, an image of which is shown, and the answers shown in the right hand column are in Laura Marx’s hand. Where the answers are the same, it is shown only once.
Netchen, or Nannette, was Antoinette Philips, aged 28 at the time, Marx’s cousin and a member of the Dutch section of the Internatrional. Martin Tupper was an English poet who penned trivial moralistic verses. Gretchen is the tragic heroine of Goethe’s Faust. “Keppler” refers to the great German astronomer, Johannes Kepler, and Spartacus was the leader of the slaves’ revolt in ancient Rome.
The formatting is as follows: Question - Answer in 1865 - Answer in Jenny’s album (if available.)
The Quality you like best - Simplicity
In man - Strength :arm-L::marx-goth::arm-R:
In Woman - Weakness :shrug-outta-hecks:
Your chief characteristic - Singleness of purpose
Your favourite occupation - Glancing at Netchen - Bookworming :read-theory:
The vice you hate most - Servility :soviet-bottom:
The vice you excuse most - Gullibility :kitty-cri-screm:
Your idea of happiness - To fight :stalin-gun-1::stalin-gun-2:
Your idea of misery - To submit :bottom-speak:
Your aversion - Martin Tupper - Martin Tupper, violet powder
Your hero - Spartacus, Keppler
Your heroine - Gretchen
The poet you like best - Aeschylus, Shakespeare - Dante, Aeschylus, Shakespeare, Goethe
The prose writer you like best - Diderot - Diderot, Lessing, Hegel, Balsac
Your favourite flower - Daphne - Laurel
Your favourite dish - Fish
Your Maxim - Nihil humani a me alienum puto [Nothing human is alien to me]
Your motto - De omnibus dubitandum [doubt everything]
Your favourite colour - Red :ussr-cry:
Your favourite Colour of eyes & hair - Black :anarchists:
Your favourite Names - N/A - Jenny, Laura
The character in history you most dislike - N/A - N/A
Karl Marx :marx:
Balsac
:PIGPOOPBALLS:
Your favourite virtue:
quality jollity
in man
to mind his own business
In woman:
not to mislay things
Chief characteristic
knowing everything by halves
Idea of happiness:
Château Margaux 1848
Idea of misery:
to go to a dentist
The vice you excuse:
excess of any sort
The vice you detest:
Cant
Your aversion:
affected stuck up woman
The characters you most dislike:
Spurgeon
Favourite occupation:
chaffing and being chaffed
Hero:
none
Heroine:
too many to name one
Poet:
Reineke de Vos, Shakespeare, Ariosto, etc.
Prose writer:
Goethe, Lessing, Dr Samelson
Flower:
Blue Bell
Colour:
any one not Aniline
Dish:
Cold: Salad, hot: Irish Stew
Maxim:
not to have any
Motto:
take it aisy
Cant
none
too many to name one
not to have any
:gigachad:
Hero:
none
Heroine:
too many to name one
Lil fuck boy
Your favourite Names - N/A - Jenny, Laura
Poor Eleanor lol
could you remind me of Eleanor Marx’s first name please
lol oh shit that’s more Jennys than I expected
