Melodrama in the Communist Manifesto

            When I first looked over the Manifesto it did not strike me so much as melodramatic, but when I took a second look I realized there was a lot to be said about the good and evil of the time period. One of the first instances where I really felt the Manifesto shouted ‘Melodrama!’ was on page 18 where they wrote:

“But not only has the bourgeoisie forged the weapons that bring death to itself; it has also called into existence the men who are to wield those weapons—the modern working class—the proletarians.

In proportion as the bourgeoisie, i.e, capital, is developed, in the same proportion is the proletariat, the modern working class, developed—a class of laborers, who live only so long as they find work, and who find work only so long as their labor increases capital. These labourers, who must sell themselves piecemeal, are a commodity, like every other article of commerce, and are consequently exposed to all the vicissitudes of competition, to all the fluctuations of the market.”

Here I think we see a stark contrast between good and evil; the proletariat, as a group of people who must basically sell their souls to capitalism, are seen as the victim here while the bourgeoisie are disguised as the capital. I think it’s interesting here to see how Marx develops his idea that the bourgeoisie can only handle so much power before chaos arises and it must start over. He starts small in this instance with this idea by saying that because of the way the society has been set up by the bourgeoisie, they have given the proletariat everything they need in order to rise up and take down the bourgeoisie all together. So, all along the proletariat has had the power and the means all along to rise up they just have not done it- this in itself is melodramatic. If the victim/hero never changes, it makes sense then that the proletariat wouldn’t rise up—it’s not in their nature, which isn’t changing.

            Backtracking now I want to look at page 17 where the authors of the Manifesto write: “Modern bourgeois society, with its relations of production, of exchange and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells.” I think this relates very much so to the point I made previously about the chaos that comes along with a powerful bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie have created a society that is so reliant on the means of production and on a world dominated by cities that now those commodities are gaining too much power and cannot be sustained by the crucial rural sector that has been cast aside. Here the melodrama lies in the caricature of the bourgeois society as a powerful sorcerer—a supernaturally endowed power. The supernatural component of this metaphor is so important in how this article comes across as melodramatic; it paves the way for the remainder of the article and makes it a point to the reader that there is something unnatural and maybe dangerous about the modern market and the way in which it is being controlled.

The last instance I want to talk about is on page 21 where the authors are just summing up their reasoning behind the villainy of the bourgeoisie. They say: “The development of Modern Industry, therefore, cuts from under its feet the very foundation on which the bourgeoisie produces and appropriates products. What the bourgeoisie therefore produces, above all, are its own grave-diggers. Its fall and the victory of the proletariat are equally inevitable.” This to me is the essential truth that always comes out in a melodrama; this is the mic drop. The bourgeoisie have dug their own grave, they have given the proletariat everything they might need to rise up—even though they never have. That’s what makes this situation melodramatic though, the proletariat (as a never-changing character) will not on its own rise up because it does not see the position that it is in. The proletariat think they are stuck in their place in society without a way out…until a greater power comes along and endows them with the strength to rise up, without them even knowing it. The development of modern industry; the supernatural bourgeoisie butt kicker.