From: Rakesh Bhandari (bhandari@BERKELEY.EDU)
Date: Wed May 11 2005 - 12:56:02 EDT
At 10:38 AM -0400 5/11/05, glevy@PRATT.EDU wrote: > > >< http://ndpr.nd.edu/review.cfm?id=2381 > > >Tom Huhn (ed.) >The Cambridge Companion to Adorno > >Tom Huhn (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to >Adorno, Cambridge University Press, 2004, 428pp, >$26.99 (pbk), ISBN 0521775000. > >Reviewed by Eduardo Mendieta, State University of New York, Stony Brook Mendieta has translated and written quite a bit about Dussel. Dussel's thinking has very important commonalities with the early Marxist Horkheimer about whom my friend John Abromeit, now a fellow at the University of Chicago, has written a dissertation which I would highly recommend-- The Dialectic of Bourgeois Society: An Intellectual Biography of the Young Max Horkheimer, 1895 1937 > >. Reason can only be approached by way >of conceptual ruin, and the ruins of the concept. >If Hegelianism is about both totality and >mediation, identity and difference, then Adorno >was the most Hegelian of 20th century thinkers, I am not sure how the ruin of the concept is Hegelian, but then I think Ivan Soll's interpretation of Hegel as a conceptualist seems persuasive. >who also, however, refused to embrace the >Hegelian tale of ultimate reconciliation, or buy >into the presupposed theodicy of the Golgotha of >reason becoming freedom in history through >endless suffering. If Geist, reason, is its >history, this history remains a scar and no >cauterization will conceal it under the smooth >neoplasm of world-historical platitudes. Today, >as Adorno said in so many ways, everything that >is social and natural is thoroughly mediated, but >the vehicle of the mediation is itself distorted >by the "totality." There is no outside, only the >mediated meditation, the trace of the whole in >everything singular, and the singular as a monad >that mirrors the whole. is there no exteriority for Adorno to the totality? Postone suggests otherwise. > This mediated mediation, >however, is always the commodity form. The >concept itself has succumbed to the theological >incantations of the circulation of wares and >exchange values. The concept itself, as Lukýcs >had already shown in his History and Class >Consciousness, and as Adorno never ceased to >underscore, wore the scarlet letter of the market >of commodities. And Adorno here was more indebted to Sohn Rethel than Lukacs, no? But I don't think there is much mention of Sohn Rethel in this Companion to Adorno. I'll check later. Yours, Rakesh > For this reason, one may safely >claim, that along with Fredric Jameson, Adorno >was one of the great Marxist dialecticians of the >20th century. > >With these claims, we have already anticipated >how to begin to evaluate The Cambridge Companion >to Adorno. Although the editor did an outstanding >job of introducing the essays, and gathering a >stellar group of scholars, the book fails as a >unity . There are some truly outstanding >contributions in this volume. J. M. Bernstein's >and Simon Jarvis's soon to be canonical essays >are gems of philosophical reflection that are >first-rate contributions to Hegelian, Marxist, >and Adornian scholarship. After Bernstein's essay >it will be easier to understand how Adorno was an >anti-Hegelian Hegelian, and how faithful >Hegelians can only be so as anti-Hegelians. >Jarvis's essay rightly draws the contours of >Adorno's historical materialism, and elucidates >the ways in which Adorno's philosophical system >was a close commentary and explication of Marx's >Grundrisse and Kapital. The essays by Christoph >Menke and Gerhard Schweppenh·user explicate the >ways in which Adorno contributed to the debate >among Kant, Hegel, and Nietzsche on the >relationship between freedom, morality, ethics, >and justice, and how Adorno, therefore, should >become a dialogue partner for second- and >third-generation Critical Theorists as they study >the nature of communicative freedom, dialogic >solidarity, and substantive justice. The book is >arguably weighted down by too many contributions >on Adorno's work on the philosophy and sociology >of the production and consumption of music. These >essays, however, are also deformed by an >eagerness to depict an Adorno in contradiction >and aporia, an attitude more appropriate for >scholarly journals and less so for tools of >reference. James Schmidt's essay on Adorno's >contributions to Thomas Mann's Doktor Faustus and >his tortured relationship with Arnold Schoenberg >is an important contribution to the intellectual >history of a decisive period in Euro-American >migrations and diasporas. It should be read as a >preemptive answer to Robert Hullot-Kentor's >mystifying contribution, which unfolds an utopian >aspect of Adorno's work on the grounds of a >disconcerting assumption, namely that Adorno's >work should be doubly alienated from the United >States, the country that always stands in his >work as a metonym for totality and modernity, and >has served as the very material condition of >possibility of most of his work. In more than one >way, Adorno's work was a meditation on America, >and that there may be interest on his obtuse and >hermetic work in the US should not be "puzzling," >but both expectable and inevitable. In fact, >Adorno may be needed more in the US than in >Germany or Europe in general. > >In addition to some of these shortcomings, the >book fails to cover some significant territory in >Adorno scholarship. Adorno's relationship to >Benjamin is not substantively addressed, and this >is a major oversight, especially as Adorno's work >is so much a commentary on what is promised and >left unresolved in Benjamin's mangled torso of a >work. Another twin to Benjamin, Ernst Bloch, is >only mentioned once, but not discussed at all. No >justice is done to Adorno's Negative Dialectics >if it is not read in tandem with Bloch's >Principle of Hope and Subject-Object: >Clarifications on Hegel. Bloch was also a >philosopher of music, and philosopher of art, in >general, who was always in Adorno's background, >much like the tain of a mirror. Adorno's >relationship to psychoanalysis and Freud should >have received more attention, notwithstanding >Joel Whitebook's essay, which should not have >been included in this volume because it is less >interested in engaging Adorno's work on its on >terms than in pushing Whitebook's own >intellectual project. It is simply not the case >that Adorno was not aware of the ways in which >sublimation does happen in and through the >psycho-social mechanism of civilization. At the >same time, however, and Adorno did not tire of >making this point, sublimation must be both >resisted and held in abeyance. This was the point >of a negative dialectics that resists all >attempts at reconciliation with a reified psychic >life. Adorno's rupture with Erich Fromm, for >instance, could have been a point of departure >for an insight into what type of Freud Adorno and >Horkheimer wanted to preserve. For both, the >Freud of instincts and intractable corporeality, >whose suffering and desiring remains >un-sublateable and irreducible, became the alibi >for a critique of consumer culture and the >discontents of civilization. It is with reference >to this Freud of tormented and tormentable bodies >that Adorno developed his "negative morality," >which refuses to reconcile Kant, or morality, and >Hegel, or ethical life, because the moral >imperative wells up as a somatic "impulse" and >"stirring impatience" of the flesh. In general, a >discussion of Adorno's type of Freudianism and >how it stands athwart post-Lacanian >psychoanalysis would have been most welcome. > >Although there are two essays that deal with >Adorno and Heidegger, their focus militates >against a more thorough and synoptic overview of >this antinomial duet. There was no contemporary >thinker against whom Adorno thought most >continuously, consistently, obsessively, and >lastingly. Heidegger haunts almost every sentence >in the Negative Dialectics, precisely because >Adorno thought that Heidegger was usurping what >he thought he himself was doing: overcoming >metaphysics by its immanent destruction. The >question of technology was not the only the issue >that brought them into vicinity. Both thinkers >dealt extensively with questions concerning the >nature of the work of art, the role of language >in thinking and philosophy, and both produced >original readings of Hegel, Kant, and Nietzsche, >among others. > >Finally, an essay on Adorno's role as a public >intellectual in Post-World War II Germany would >have been very useful and would have allowed >readers of the volume to access the impact, both >beneficial and detrimental, to the development of >West German political culture. The prejudice that >Adorno was an elitist, disengaged from public >culture, has begun to be refuted and dissolved by >studies of the archives of the Institute for >Social Research, and the publication of his >extensive correspondence with colleagues, >university officials, newspaper editors, and >radio station directors[3]. These drawbacks >notwithstanding, The Cambridge Companion to >Adorno makes for a good point of entry into one >of the most brilliant and capacious thinkers of >the 20th century . > > >[1] See in particular Stefan Mller-Doohm, >Adorno: Eine Biographie (Frankfurt am Main: >Suhrkamp Verlag, 2003), and Lorenz J·ger, Adorno: >A Political Biography (New Haven, CT: Yale >University Press, 2004). > >[2] Theodor W. Adorno, Philosophische >Terminologie, Vol 1 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp >Verlag, 1973), 7. > >[3] See Alex Demirovic, Der nonkoformistische >Intellektuelle. Die Entwicklung der Kritischen >Theorie zur Frankfurter Schule (Frankfurt am >Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1999). See the thorough >review essay by Max Pensky, "Beyond the Message >in the Bottle: The Other Critical Theory" >Constellations, Vol. 10, No. 1 (2003) 135-144. >See also Jrgen Habermas's essay on Adorno's >centennial celebration, "Dual-Layered Time: >Personal Notes on Philosopher T. W. Adorno in the >'50's" Logos 2.4 (Fall 2003), available on-line >at: http://www.logosjournal.com/ > >Attachment converted: general:untitled-2 1 (TEXT/ttxt) (002127BF)
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