Robert Hullot-Kentor. Things Beyond Resemblance: Collected Essays on Theodor W. Adorno. New York: Columbia University Press, 2006. xii + 322 pp. $34.50, cloth, ISBN 978-0-231-13658-7.
Reviewed by Thomas Wheatland
Published on H-German (July, 2007)
An Adorno Renaissance? Critical Theory and gers and destructiveness of the Cold War, and the George W. Bush's America renewed interest in the intellectual legacy of Karl Since the centennial celebration of his birth Marx? On the other hand, however, this earlier on September 11, 2003, the work of Theodor W. reception of Adorno's writings and thought creat‐ Adorno has been gaining a wider audience on ed many false assumptions and characterizations both sides of the Atlantic. Three biographies were that might help fuel the current revival as old timed to coincide with the festivities in Frankfurt myths are de-bunked and Adorno is grappled with am Main, and a steady stream of formerly unpub‐ anew. As the common images of Adorno as a "Ger‐ lished writings from the Adorno archive are now man mandarin" and "cultural elitist" are re-inves‐ appearing in print.[1] Nearly all of these writings tigated, we can wrestle again with the unrelenting are already available in English translation or are complexity of his philosophical and critical theo‐ in the pipelines at various presses. We may be retical commitments and to re-consider Adorno's witnessing the emergence of an Adorno Renais‐ thought regarding regression, conformity, and the sance. domination implicit in reason within our own time.[2] On the one hand, it seems inconceivable that the current interest in Adorno could ever match The timing, then, is ideal for the publication the breadth and intensity of interest achieved in of Robert Hullot-Kentor's collected writings on the the immediate wake of the New Left. From the work of Theodor W. Adorno. The product of over late 1960s through the 1980s, Adorno and with twenty years of work, Hullot-Kentor's book shat‐ him the legacy of the Frankfurt School enjoyed an ters many of the myths that have emerged regard‐ intense and vigorous examination throughout Eu‐ ing Adorno and provokes us to recognize the con‐ rope and the United States. How could such a phe‐ sistency and complexity of Adorno's thought. In nomenon recur without the scrutiny and outrage addition to being one of Adorno's most dedicated regarding the Vietnam War, the bewildering dan‐ readers and expositors in the English speaking H-Net Reviews world, Hullot-Kentor also works as a distin‐ case of Horkheimer or Marcuse, with whom, by guished translator of Adorno's writings. Begin‐ the way, I had a less complicated and, if you like, ning with Kierkegaard: Construction of the Aes‐ more intimate relationship, no one would have thetic (1989), Hullot-Kentor has gone on to trans‐ ever thought of saying such a thing. Adorno had late Aesthetic Theory (1997) and Philosophy of an immediacy of awareness, a spontaneity of New Music (2006) and is in the process of com‐ thought, and a power of formulation which I have pleting work on Negative Dialectics (forthcom‐ never encountered before or since. One could not ing), in addition to his work as editor of the re‐ observe the process of development of Adorno's cently published Current of Music: Elements of a thoughts: they issued from him complete--he was Radio Theory (2006). a virtuoso in that respect. Also, he was simply not The demands Adorno places on his readers able to drop below his own level; he could not es‐ and translators are well-known, even to those cape the strain of his own thinking for a moment. only casually familiar with his writings. He con‐ As long as one was with Adorno, one was caught structs lengthy, complex sentences by liberally up in the movement of his thought. Adorno did employing independent and dependent clauses. not have the common touch, it was impossible for Like the musical composers that he admired, him, in an altogether painful way to be common‐ Adorno stretched the German language in a man‐ place."[3] ner similar to the way in which atonality and dis‐ The marriage of form and content provides a sonance stretched the pre-existing confnes of more considerable challenge for Adorno's transla‐ classical composition. At the same time, Adorno tors. Completely literal translations are wholly in‐ was also committed to the legacy of German Ideal‐ adequate for a thinker and linguistic stylist of ism. Believing that the conclusions of dialectical Adorno's abilities. Not only must the translator be thinking were meaningless without an apprecia‐ sensitive to replicating as closely as possible the tion of the process of dialectical logic, Hegel and virtuosity of the German original, he or she must his disciples sought to develop a writing style that also possess a frm grasp of the academic disci‐ resisted simplifcation. For Adorno, this purpose‐ plines (philosophy, aesthetics, sociology, psycholo‐ fully intricate writing style took on a moral imper‐ gy, literary studies, and musicology) and tradi‐ ative as he came to recognize the alliance that tions (German Idealism, Marxism, psychoanalysis, could be forged between discursive complexity phenomenology, and modernism) that Adorno and the concept of non-identity that lay at the drew upon to formulate his own ideas. This care heart of his philosophical project. In addition to and rigor has been the hallmark of Hullot-Ken‐ the sophistication and elliptical nature of tor's English translations of Adorno, and they sim‐ Adorno's style, the reader also is rewarded with ilarly equip him to be one of the most astute com‐ Adorno's considerable wit and passion for word‐ mentators on Adorno's thought. play. His word games and allusions to other au‐ For some, Adorno's lack of a "common touch" thors and other texts are not only cleverly embed‐ has led to utter bewilderment; for others, it has ded within his texts, they also serve vital func‐ led to considerable confusion and disagreement tions by helping to illustrate, underscore, and/or regarding the meaning and importance of partic‐ problematize various ideas or themes. Form and ular aspects of Adorno's legacy. Things Beyond Re‐ content thus are wedded to each other in a man‐ semblance has much to ofer both audiences (the ner that is both dazzling and intimidating for the perplexed and the partisans), but it is not a book German reader. As Jürgen Habermas, Adorno's for newcomers or the uninitiated. Hullot-Kentor is younger colleague, recalled: "Adorno was a ge‐ neither aiming to paraphrase nor to distill nius. I say that without a hint of ambiguity. In the
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Adorno's thought. Writing in the same spirit as his starting point for the essays that will subsequent‐ translations, Hullot-Kentor remains sensitive to ly follow. Adorno's intentions and aims. For Adorno, the The book is divided into sixteen essays. Al‐ simplifcation and/or clarifcation of his thought though each section was written independently would have represented a destructive distortion and can stand on its own, an exhilarating efect is of his writings' form and contents. Rather than of‐ produced by situating them together in this for‐ fering something akin to an "Adorno for Begin‐ mat--much in the same way that an individual ners," Hullot-Kentor is writing for Adorno's inter‐ painting is transformed when thoughtfully incor‐ mediates and experts, whom he provides with porated into an exhibit. Each essay possesses its many useful clarifcations and elucidations of own distinct message and focus, but when they Adorno's thought and style. are all assembled together they interpenetrate Hullot-Kentor's introduction, ironically enti‐ one another, helping to illuminate Adorno's com‐ tled "Origin is the Goal," makes a provocative, stir‐ plex themes and concepts in a manner similar to ring case for Adorno's contemporary signifcance the prisms that Adorno used as a model for his for North American readers. Primarily exploring own writings. This remarkable achievement is the development of Adorno's concept of regres‐ largely possible because the collected writings in‐ sion, Hullot-Kentor partly uses this inspiration as terweave so many of the same themes continu‐ an analytic tool for examining George W. Bush ously throughout the book. As a contribution to and contemporary U.S. society. In one of several the series in which it is included, the book not sur‐ provocative moments, he writes, "Adorno's philos‐ prisingly concentrates on exploring and clarifying ophy took shape in dread recognition of the rever‐ Adorno's aesthetics, but Hullot-Kentor is careful to sion of society to the primitive.... The problem that show how Adorno's aesthetics was an integral marks the center and circumference of his part of his philosophy, social theory, and music thought was the efort to comprehend and per‐ criticism. Thus, the focus on aesthetics helps to haps even circumvent this logic of progress as re‐ clarify Adorno's understanding of the dialectic of gression. Without a doubt the preeminent reason enlightenment and the inspiration for his nega‐ that his work must be of vital concern in the Unit‐ tive dialectics, while at the same time these philo‐ ed States is for what precisely can be learned sophical discoveries help to clarify Adorno's artis‐ from it in a nation that has so palpably entered tic and musical preferences. primitive times" (pp. 2-3). As this quotation also The book and its component essays cannot be makes clear, Hullot-Kentor uses the concept of re‐ simply classifed into thematic categories, because gression both to introduce his readers to the ways of the work's prismatic structure. Each essay grap‐ in which Adorno viewed the world and to his for‐ ples with a diferent set of Adorno's concepts in mulation of a philosophy of negative dialectics. slightly diferent ways. The frst essay, "Back to Thus, the concept of regression becomes a step‐ Adorno," for example, begins with an exploration ping stone for introducing readers to other crucial of the reasons for the declining U.S. interest in components of Adorno's approach to critical theo‐ Adorno's work during the 1990s. While some of ry--such as his understanding of the dialectic of the reasons are clearly self-evident (such as the enlightenment, his concerns regarding non-identi‐ decline of German Studies, the growing unfamil‐ ty, his use of concepts more broadly, and the way iarity with German Idealism, the erosion of inter‐ in which aesthetics formed an essential comple‐ est in Marxism, and the numerous poor transla‐ ment to negative dialectics. The result is an ideal tions of Adorno's work in English), Hullot-Kentor may surprise some of his readers by also holding
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American intellectuals' interest in poststructural‐ missed the point. Adorno, he insists, became en‐ ism and postmodernism responsible. This is a tangled in a radical denunciation of reason that provocative point, and it would have been fasci‐ could not ground itself. Realizing this, the best nating to see the author develop it more explicitly. Adorno could do was to ignore the contradiction. In part, this would have been of interest because This was possible in Adorno's case because he many U.S. readers of Adorno have made the case could distract himself with art" (p. 31). that his negative dialectics and philosophy of non- In rejecting Adorno's relationship to aesthet‐ identity have afnities with the deconstructive ics, Habermas revealed his own failure to compre‐ impulses and methods of French intellectuals hend the relationship that Adorno recognized be‐ such as Derrida. Hullot-Kentor's distancing of tween reason, aesthetics, and the Enlightenment. Adorno from the traditions of French theory be‐ As Hullot-Kentor clearly shows, Adorno's integra‐ comes all the more intriguing, because he then tion of reason and aesthetics made him a true carries out a rigorous analysis of the origins and heir of the Enlightenment--a thinker following in authorship of The Dialectic of Enlightenment the footsteps of both Kant and Schiller. Adorno's (1944) to illustrate how misunderstood Adorno interpretation of the dialectic of Enlightenment was by Jürgen Habermas, one of critical theory's highlighted the domination and self-sacrifce in‐ most articulate critics of poststructuralism. herent in the "cunning of reason," and aesthetics Habermas applauded the analysis of the En‐ ofered an alternative orientation to the natural lightenment that formed the basis for world that remained frmly grounded in reason. Horkheimer and Adorno's The Dialectic of En‐ Hullot-Kentor explains: "In art, domination is able lightenment, but simultaneously rejected the cri‐ to become liberation, the truth of the whole, be‐ tique of reason that emerged from it. Habermas cause the same process of the domination of na‐ viewed this treatment of reason as a Nietzschean ture that society carries out occurs within the art gesture imported into the project by Adorno work; the same sacrifcial act of reason is carried rather than Horkheimer. Thus, Habermas dis‐ out by art through its construction. The dialectic tanced the two authors from each other in order of enlightenment is the inner process of the art to rescue Horkheimer's materialist theory of soci‐ work.... However, whereas the sacrifces required ety and at the same time question Adorno's nega‐ by self-preservative reason in the actual domina‐ tive dialectics in reason's name. Hullot-Kentor tion of nature are silenced by the semblance of sympathizes with the bewilderment that Adorno's necessity woven by the principle of identity, art critique of reason has created among readers mourns the sacrifces it carries out. Art undoes its such as Habermas, but he strongly rejects the im‐ self-identity by the same process through which it plication that Adorno shares much in common establishes its self-identity. This is the form of art's with the French disciples of Nietzsche who in‐ cunning.... Art works take themselves apart as spired the poststructuralist movement. According they put themselves together, and as they do so to Hullot-Kentor, Habermas and other like-mind‐ the progressive Hegelian dialectic is brought to a ed critics of Adorno have failed to recognize that standstill in a moment of expression. Art becomes Adorno was not simply aiming to articulate a de‐ memory of nature in the mourning of its structive critique of reason. Instead, he was also caesuras" (p. 43). attempting to recuperate reason in the process. As The book's title essay "Things Beyond Resem‐ Hullot-Kentor explains, Adorno "is pursuing a cri‐ blance" helps to clarify Adorno's aesthetics--the tique of reason by way of reason. How this is pos‐ topic that emerged as the reconciliation of Hullot- sible is not obvious; if it were, it would not have Kentor's investigation of Adorno's critique and at‐ occupied all of Adorno's life. But Habermas
4 H-Net Reviews tempted recuperation of reason. This subsequent The "new music" of the early Schoenberg and the essay then complements "Back to Adorno" by ad‐ Second Viennese School resisted such appropria‐ dressing the specifcs of Adorno's aesthetics. tion by rejecting the impulse to dominate nature. "Things Beyond Resemblance" refects on the un‐ By shattering musical conventions left and right, published English version of Adorno's The Philos‐ the young Schoenberg was able to rupture the ophy of New Music in an efort to explore the dialectic of enlightenment by producing a music ways in which exposure to American mass cul‐ of non-identity in which the subject does not ture informed the text and to consider the reasons wield mastery over its object. As Hullot Kentor ex‐ why Adorno radically re-imagined this book and plains, the "potential of art, then, is the ability to destroyed his original English translation of the restore to nature the qualitative, historical dimen‐ early 1940s. These concrete analyses then provide sion that subjectivity, enthralled with the spurious the impetus for a conceptual re-appraisal of The objectivity of its own lawfulness--a considerable Philosophy of New Music that provides an oppor‐ act of imagination that claims to be its opposite-- tunity for Hullot-Kentor to refect on Adorno's deprived nature of in the frst place by dominat‐ musical taste and its relation to his political and ing it and transmuting its raw material" (p. 62). philosophical agendas. The next essay, "The Philosophy of Disso‐ Hullot-Kentor has devoted serious considera‐ nance," explores what particularly attracted tion to music's distinctive aesthetic and cognitive Adorno to the music of the early Schoenberg and properties. These equip music with enormous what led him to see atonality as an artistic corre‐ power, but it is (alas) a power that can be com‐ late to his philosophical concerns regarding non- pletely corrupted--as Adorno frequently noted. identity. Adorno, according to Hullot-Kentor, be‐ This potential for corruption does not suggest, lieved that "this isolated music had, in the however, as many of Adorno's casual readers as‐ strength of its isolation, become a singular reposi‐ sume, that he preferred the music of the sympho‐ tory of critical historical experience.... [A]rt be‐ ny hall over popular music; Adorno was not a cul‐ comes the unconscious writing of history through tural snob. Instead, Hullot-Kentor insists that its isolation from society" (p. 70). The early Adorno's Philosophy of New Music was as much Schoenberg thus represented a reaction against of an attack against "classical" music as it was both the "classical" music of symphony halls and against "pop." The commercial forces of the mar‐ the "popular" music of the dancehalls. Schoen‐ ket place had invaded both--leaving only the berg's "new music" could not be readily appropri‐ "new" music, which stubbornly resisted these ated for the commercial purposes of "pop" music, forces of cultural assimilation as a viable aesthetic and at the same time it shattered the semblance option. Hullot-Kentor rightly sees The Philosophy of beauty and the illusion of pure subjectivity that of New Music as an aesthetic manifesto in which were the hallmarks of "classical" music. As Hullot- Adorno links clear issues of artistic right and Kentor explains, "what Schoenberg discovered-- wrong to his assessments of musical quality. What according to Adorno--was that the impulses sedi‐ makes this manifesto so diferent from others is mented in the material could be bindingly orga‐ that it was not written for the revolutionary mass‐ nized according to principles of contrast. Disso‐ es. Writing in the wake of Hitler's rise to power nance, the bearer of historical sufering, would be and during the opening salvos of the Second the rational order binding together melody and World War, Adorno understood that the Nazis had harmony" (p. 70). raided and corrupted Germany's rich cultural In the succession of these frst three essays, legacy and shown that both "pop" and the "clas‐ Hullot-Kentor demonstrates the technique that he sics" could be appropriated for barbaric purposes.
5 H-Net Reviews deploys throughout the book. Although each essay duction to Adorno has been mediated through the is initiated by a distinctively diferent provoca‐ writings of Frederic Jameson. Although Jameson tion, each cumulatively builds on the previous has proclaimed a frm allegiance to Adorno and ones in a manner that Adorno would have ad‐ cited Adorno's writings as a main inspiration for mired. The style and aims of Adorno's writings his own approach to literature and art, Hullot- are consequently preserved by the book's pris‐ Kentor questions the validity of these claims matic architecture. Adorno famously inverted through a close reading of Jameson's writings. Hegel's dictum resulting in the memorable phrase These readings lead Hullot-Kentor to question "the whole is the false." None of these essays aims Jameson's appraisal of Adorno, as well as to ques‐ at risking a distortion of Adorno's thought in an tion Jameson's critical project and its popularity. efort to communicate a distilled sum-total.[4] Things Beyond Resemblance is a book Adorno The book is also flled with several provoca‐ scholars will appreciate. While it may leave some tive challenges to the standard images that many with lingering questions about how to situate may possess of Adorno. In addition to rescuing Adorno's sociological writings into Hullot-Kentor's Adorno's critical theory from the poststructural interpretation of the philosophical and aesthetic camp and challenging the clichéd image of writings, it will satisfy many readers who fnd Adorno as über-snob, Hullot-Kentor also takes Adorno's negative dialectics and aesthetic theory aim at several other common misperceptions of elusive. This is no small feat, and it should prove Adorno in the United States. First, in "Title Essay: to be a valuable resource for those re-examining Allegory and the Essay as Form" and then in Adorno in the wake of his apparent revival. "What is Mechnical Reproduction," Hullot-Kentor Notes re-evaluates the relationship between the work of [1]. Detlev Claussen, Theodor W. Adorno. Ein Walter Benjamin and Adorno in a manner likely Letztes Genie (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer Verlag, to grab the attention of readers from the felds of 2003); Lorenz Jäger, Adorno--Eine politische Bi‐ cultural studies and media studies. In addition to ographie (Munich: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, challenging the traditional notions of Benjamin's 2003); and Stefan Müller-Doohm, Adorno: Eine Bi‐ infuence on Adorno, Hullot-Kentor also chal‐ ographie (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, lenges some of Benjamin's most frequently cited 2003). See also Theodor W. Adorno, Briefe an die theses on art, technology, and aura that have been Eltern, 1939-1951 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp used to dismiss Adorno's work. Too frequently, Verlag, 2003); Theodor W. Adorno, Kinderheit in Benjamin and Adorno have been juxtaposed as Amorbach (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, tragic hero and villainous "company man." To cor‐ 2003); and Theodor W. Adorno, Vorlesung über rect this misperception, Hullot-Kentor dismantles Negativ Dialektik (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp the caricature of Adorno as Benjamin's nemesis Verlag, 2003). Subsequently, several other collec‐ by highlighting how illogical and problematic tions of lectures and correspondences have been Benjamin's writings on mass art were. When jux‐ published--most notably, several volumes of the taposed with the other essays and their rumina‐ Adorno-Horkheimer letters. tions on Adorno's aesthetic theory, the criticisms of Benjamin help to underscore the validity of [2]. Another book promoting a similar goal of Adorno's concerns regarding the culture industry re-evaluating Adorno and his writings was pub‐ and the redemptive capacity of serious art. lished this spring by the University of Minnesota Press. This book focuses particular attention on Second, Hullot-Kentor is likely to also capture Adorno's experiences in exile to revise and to re- the attention of many intellectuals whose intro‐ appraise Adorno's engagement with U.S. mass cul‐
6 H-Net Reviews ture: David Jenemann, Adorno in America (Min‐ neapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007). [3]. Jürgen Habermas, Autonomy and Solidar‐ ity, ed. Peter Dews (New York: Verso, 1992), 220. [4]. Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia: Re‐ fections from a Damaged Life, tr. E. F. N. Jephcott (New York: Verso, 1974), 50.
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Citation: Thomas Wheatland. Review of Hullot-Kentor, Robert. Things Beyond Resemblance: Collected Essays on Theodor W. Adorno. H-German, H-Net Reviews. July, 2007.
URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=13366
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