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"This outstanding
Companion proves the usual assumption wrong that there is no possibility today to contribute something new and original to the work of Theodor W. Adorno. The three editors, all equally superb experts of his philosophy, have managed with circumspection and discretion to collect thoroughly stimulating articles that together open up a novel and fresh perspective on this central figure of critical theory. Everyone who's keeping up with what's going on in this tradition has to read this
Companion."
--Axel Honneth, Jack C. Weinstein Professor of the Humanities, Columbia University
"An exemplary
Companion of extremely well-formed essays together covering the extraordinary range of Adorno's philosophical, social, and aesthetic thought. Highly recommended for anyone working through the issues and relevance of critical theory today."
--Lydia Goehr, Professor of Philosophy, Columbia University
As one of the leading continental philosophers of the last century, and a pioneering member of the Frankfurt School, Theodor W. Adorno was the author of seminal--and at times quite radical-- scholarship in aesthetics, social theory, moral philosophy, and the history of modern philosophy which concerns the contradictions of modern society in relation to human suffering and the human condition. Having made substantial contributions to critical theory which levy searching critiques of the 'culture industry' and the 'identity thinking' of modern Western society, Adorno helped establish an interdisciplinary but philosophically rigorous study of culture, and provided some of the most startling and revolutionary critiques of Western society to date.
A Companion to Adorno is the largest collection of newly commissioned essays by a distinguished array of Adorno scholars, specialists, and leading interpreters ever gathered in a single volume. Part of the distinguished
Blackwell Companions to Philosophy series, this important contribution to the field explores Adorno's lasting impact on many sub-fields of philosophy from a rich variety of perspectives. Chapters in each of seven sections explore Adorno's intellectual foundations, his critiques of culture, his views on ethics and politics, and his analyses of history and domination, and collectively asserting the contemporary importance of his social thought and broader intellectual legacy.
A singular advancement in Adorno scholarship,
A Companion to Adorno is an indispensable resource for Adorno specialists and researchers working in modern European philosophy, contemporary cultural criticism, social theory, German history, and aesthetics.
List of contents
Notes on Contributors ix
Editors' Introduction xv
About the Editors xix
Part I Intellectual Foundations 1 1 Adorno: A Biographical Sketch 3
Peter E. Gordon 2 Adorno's Inaugural Lecture: The Actuality of Philosophy in the Age of Mass Production 21
Roger Foster 3 Reading Kierkegaard 35
Marcia Morgan 4 Guilt and Mourning: Adorno's Debt to and Critique of Benjamin 51
Alexander Stern 5 Adorno and the Second Viennese School 67
Sherry D. Lee Part II Cultural Analysis 85 6 The Culture Industry 87
Fred Rush 7 Adorno and Horkheimer on Anti-Semitism 103
Fabian Freyenhagen 8 Adorno and Jazz 123
Andrew Bowie 9 Adorno's Democratic Modernism in America: Leaders and Educators as Political Artists 139
Shannon Mariotti 10 Inhuman Methods for an Inhumane World: Adorno's Empirical Social Research, 1938-1950 153
Charles Clavey Part III History and Domination 173 11 Adorno and Blumenberg: Nonconceptuality and the
Bilderverbot 175
Martin Jay 12 Philosophy of History 193
Iain Macdonald 13 The Anthropology in
Dialectic of Enlightenment 207
Pierre-François Noppen 14 Adorno's Reception of Weber and Lukács 221
Michael J. Thompson 15 Adorno's Aesthetic Model of Social Critique 237
Andrew Huddleston 16 The Critique of the Enlightenment 251
Martin Shuster Part IV Social Theory and Empirical Inquiry 271 17 "Nothing is True Except the Exaggerations:" The Legacy of
the Authoritarian Personality 273
David Jenemann 18 Exposing Antagonisms: Adorno on the Possibilities of Sociology 287
Matthias Benzer and Juljan Krause 19 Adorno and Marx 303
Peter Osborne 20 Adorno's Three Contributions to a Theory of Mass Psychology and Why They Matter 321
Eli Zaretsky 21 Adorno and Postwar German Society 335
Jakob Norberg Part V Aesthetics 349 22 Aesthetic Autonomy 351
Owen Hulatt 23 Adorno and Literary Criticism 365
Henry W. Pickford 24 Adorno as a Modernist Writer 383
Richard Eldridge 25 Adorno's
Aesthetic Theory 397
Eva Geulen 26 Aesthetic Theory as Social Theory 413
Peter Uwe Hohendahl 27 Adorno, Music, and the Ineffable 427
Michael Gallope 28 Adorno and Opera 443
Richard Leppert Part VI Negative Dialectics 457 29 What is Negative Dialectics?: Adorno's Reevaluation of Hegel 459
Terry Pinkard 30 Adorno's Critique of Heidegger 473
Espen Hammer 31 Concept and Object: Adorno's Critique of Kant 487
J. M. Bernstein 32 Critique and Disappointment:
Negative Dialectics as Late Philosophy 503
Max Pensky 33 Negative Dialectics and Philosophical Truth 519
Brian O'Connor 34 Adorno and Scholem: The Heretical Redemption of Metaphysics 531
Asaf Angermann 35 Adorno's Concept of Metaphysical Experience 549
Peter E. Gordon Part VII Ethics and Politics 565 36 After Auschwitz 567
Christian Skirke 37 Forever Resistant? Adorno and Radical Transformation of Society 583
Maeve Cooke 38 Adorno's Materialist Ethic of Love 601
Kathy J. Kiloh 39 Adorno's Metaphysics of Moral Solidarity in the Moment of its Fall 615
James Gordon Finlayson Index 631
About the author
Peter E. Gordon is the Amabel B. James Professor of History, Faculty Affiliate in the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures, and Faculty Affiliate in the Department of Philosophy at Harvard University.
Espen Hammer is Professor of Philosophy at the College of Liberal Arts of Temple University. He has held professorships at the University of Oslo and the University of Essex.
Max Pensky is Professor of Philosophy and co-Director of the Institute for Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention at Binghamton University, State University of New York.
