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The life of Karl Marx was so typical of Jewish rebels that older biographers tended to disregard this aspect of it. More recently, psychohistoric approaches have given greater stress to this theme, as exemplified by Arnold Kunzli's Karl Marx: Eine Psychographie (Vienna: Europa Verlag, 1966). More recent writers have argued against this notion. In the historical context of Marx's upbringing, upper middle class Jews, partly assimilated to German culture, tended to dislike poorer Jews, partly out of embarrassment. Marx was ready to appeal to anti-Jewish sentiments in his own writings, as was Engels; both supported German unification, & were hostile not only to Jews but to Slavs & many other nationalities. The expression 'the Jew' served Marx as a synecdoche for the money economy prior to his development of a concept of capitalism as a system. The Jews played no important role in Marx's thought, but were subject to his anger as were other groups. Psychohistoric explanations are not needed for actions such as these, & thus should not be sought. W. H. Stoddard.