Author
Ludwik Krzywicki 1859-1941

He was born in Płock on the 21st of August 1859 into an impoverished aristocratic family. He was brought up in the period of intense anti-Polish terror after the fall of the January Uprising. The strongest formative influence was then exerted by his grandfather Franciszek Iwanicki, the former insurgent of very liberal views. From 1878 Krzywicki studied maths at the University of Warsaw. Four years later he also took up medical studies. During his university education he was fascinated by Marx’s Capital and – together with Stanisław Krusiński and Bronisław Białobłocki – set up the first Marxist circle in Poland. As publicist, Krzywicki made his debut in 1883, criticising Spencer and his Polish followers. It was then, too, that he was expelled from the University for Socialist demonstrations. He resolved to continue his political activity abroad. He emigrated and took up studies in anthropology, sociology, and economy in Leipzig and also worked on his Polish translation of Capital. He entered into contacts with foreign socialists in Switzerland and France. In 1885 he returned to the partitioned Poland. At that time he was already writing a lot, and at the same time engaged in conspiratorial activities in, for instance, the Union of Polish Workers (ZRP). In course of time, he moved still further away from the revolutionary standpoint and argued for reaching various social achievements by an evolutionary path. After the First World War he lectured at the University of Warsaw and headed the Institute of Social Economy. He died of a heart attack in Warsaw on the 10th of June, 1941. His publications include Ludy. Zarys antropologii etnicznej (1894), and Kurs systematyczny antropologii (1897-1902). Many of his scattered works were collected in a volume called Studia socjologiczne (1923).

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