This collection of lively and insightful essays--including several translated into English for the first time--covers a wide range of topics and figures too often neglected by the dominant trends in Marxist literature. Löwy offers a unique exploration of the role of romanticism as one of the key sources of the Marxist critique of capitalist civilization. And he shows how Rosa Luxemburg, Antonio Gramsci, and Walter Benjamin all share an understanding of socialism as the only truly human alternative to the modern forms of exploitation and oppression found in a capitalist society. Similar themes are pursued in the engaging essays on religion, utopia, and other topics.