Saul Kussiel Padover (1905-1981) was a historian and political scientist at the New School for Social Research in New York City. In this seminal biography, published in 1978, Padover explains in the "Author's Note": "In this book, which has been twelve years in the making, I have aimed at something not available in other biographies of Marx: an objective account of him as a human being -- lover, husband, friend, fighter, father, foe -- rather than as the philosophic symbol and revolutionary idol that he has become." Padover posits that the most important book that Marx read, and one that was clearly a turning point in his own intellectual development from idealism to materialism, was Ludwig Feuerbach's The Essence of Christianity. He believes that the Communist Manifesto "Introduced a new and baneful note into the revolutionary movement -- the idea of conflict and hate. Up to that time, socialists had tended to be humanists and utopians, emphasizing the brotherhood of man, rather than the solidarity of class... Marx stressed struggle, violence, and class." Padover further argues, "Marx speaks both to the heart and the mind, invoking hopes alleged to be based on 'science.' That Marx's communism and his economics are not, as he fondly believed, 'scientific' in any meaningful sense of the word, has little relevance in terms of communicating ideas. Marx's economic writings... are the Scriptures for those who aspire to transform the world." This is an excellent biography of Marx, for anyone who is wanting an honest yet sympathetic portrait of the man.