Imagination

Abstract

Taking imagination as a theme, this chapter shows how apparently conventional topics and interests occurring in the compositions and letters of the teenage Engels were connected by him to the clandestine political struggles in his German context. That context was one of religious repression and authoritarian monarchism. Writing anonymously, young Friedrich learned how to engage with progressive, liberalizing politics, which necessarily proceeded in coded fashion. Messages concerning social change were encoded in poetry, music, art, and fiction, which he pursued when working for his family’s business in Bremen. Protected by pseudonyms, he achieved publication in this adult world from age sixteen onwards, and with increasing success and notoriety. Denied university entrance by his commercially minded father, Engels educated himself and urged former schoolfriends to join his “virtual” university.