Q 01/05

Graffiti from France's May 1968 student revolt declared the writer a Marxist of which comedian's persuasion?

A) Groucho

B) Harpo

C) Chico

D) Zeppo

Answer · why

A) Groucho

Groucho, the wisecracking star of Duck Soup, happens to share a surname with Karl Marx, so the joke wrote itself. The line was one of the slogans daub...

Q 02/05

Which English naturalist politely thanked Karl Marx in 1873 for a gift copy of Das Kapital?

A) Henry Walter Bates

B) Alfred Russel Wallace

C) Charles Darwin

D) Richard Owen

Answer · why

C) Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin replied that he wished he understood more of political economy and so were more worthy of the gift. The copy Marx sent still survives i...

Q 03/05

Which US president did Karl Marx congratulate on his re-election in an 1864 address from the First International?

A) Ulysses S. Grant

B) Abraham Lincoln

C) Andrew Johnson

D) James Buchanan

Answer · why

B) Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln received the address through the American ambassador in London, who sent back a courteous reply. Marx's text praised the president's w...

Q 04/05

Which George Orwell novel features Old Major, a prize boar who stands partly for Karl Marx?

A) Burmese Days

B) Coming Up for Air

C) Nineteen Eighty-Four

D) Animal Farm

Answer · why

D) Animal Farm

Animal Farm opens with Old Major urging the animals to overthrow their human masters. Like Marx, the old boar dies before the revolution he inspired t...

Q 05/05

According to the famous opening line of The Communist Manifesto, what kind of being is haunting Europe?

A) A vampire

B) A spectre

C) A demon

D) A dragon

Answer · why

B) A spectre

A spectre opens the pamphlet: the spectre of communism. The authors argued that rulers who branded every opponent a communist were admitting that comm...