Capital

Translated from the third German edition, this landmark work of economics had an immense influence on the 19th and 20th centuries. Also commonly known as Das Kapital, its German title, this book offers a critical analysis of political economy intended to reveal the unacknowledged forces behind capitalist production. Capital imagines the ancient history of the capitalist economic system, and examines the accumulation and concentration of capital, commercial competition, the banking system, land ownership and rent, among other topics. Karl Marx spent two decades preparing the first volume, which published in 1867. He died in 1883 with the work unfinished; Marx's collaborator Friedrich Engels drew on Marx's notes and manuscripts to complete the work.