Germany: a Self-Portrait: A Collection of German Writings from 1914 to 1943

was born at Zamosc, Polish Russia, on 25 December 1870. At an early age she joined in revolutionary activities against Czarism, and was forced to leave Poland for Zurich, Switzerland, where she studied economics and became a Marxist. In 1895 she migrated to Germany and became a German citizen by marriage. Outstanding abilities as a writer and speaker brought her to prominence in the Social Democratic Party. In 1898 she became editor of the Saxon Arbeiterzeitung, and afterwards joined the staff of the Leipziger Volkszeitung. Experiences during her youth in Poland and in Russia during the revolution of 1905 caused her to take a position far to the left of the Socialist officialdom. Courageous opposition to militarism led to her arrest in 1915, when she was sentenced to a year's imprisonment on charges of inciting insubordination of the troops, and was kept in preventive custody for the remainder of the war. Released shortly before the 1918 revolution she was untiring in her efforts to carry the revolution through to its conclusion. Together with Karl Liebknecht she was one of the founders of the Communist Party of Germany and one of the editors of that party's newspaper, the Rote Fahne. She was arrested on 15 January 1919 and brutally murdered by her captors on the way to prison. She was the author of many political and economic works, of which The Accumulation of Capital is the best known.

from Letters to Karl and Luise Kautsky by ROSA LUXEMBURG, translated by Louis P. Lochner

Barnimstrasse Jail, 20.1.16

Beloved Lulu:

You ask whether I am making any plans with reference to a milder climate for recuperation. 'Ask the horse,' replied the Sunday rider when people asked him whither he was galloping. You forget that different gentlemen are interested in me: for instance the state's attorney at Düsseldorf, the local state's attorney, Comrade von Kessel, etc. Whether they can spare me in the Mark in the immediate

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