Lyubov Axelrod as an interpreter of Spinoza

Abstract

As a follower and collaborator of Plekhanov, as well as a prominent representative of the so-called “Mechanists” in the 1920s, Lyubov Axelrod proposed a consistent interpretation of Spinoza throughout her entire philosophical activity, before and after the Russian Revolution of 1917. This essay reconstructs the development of this interpretation, showing how Axelrod’s image changed, in the eyes of her critics, from that of an unyielding guardian of Marxist orthodoxy to that of a revisionist heretic—although she always remained basically faithful to her own positions.