“'Max Weber's Desk is now my Altar': Marianne Weber and the intellectual heritage of her husband”

Max Weber died suddenly on 14 June 1920 in Munich mid-way through a course of lectures on “Sociology of the State” and with two books in the press: the three volumes of his sociology of religion, and the first four chapters of Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. His widow, Marianne Weber, at the time active in regional politics and the women's movement, immediately suspended all commitments other than work on her dead husband's intellectual legacy. In the following years she completed Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft from manuscripts, edited four volumes of his collected writings, assembled Max Weber's extensive correspondence, and in 1926 completed a definitive biography. This detailed account of Marianne Weber's construction of her dead husband's intellectual legacy provides a fresh perspective upon Weber's reputation.