Customer Reviews

Negative Dialectics (Negative Dialectics Ppr)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Famously bad translation of the central piece of Adorno's philosophy. I recommend getting Aesthetic Theory now and waiting for the next translator's attempt.

Negative Dialectic is very thought-provoking and difficult text in itself, but it is worth of the effort. If you are interested in Adorno, it is a must-have. Yet the English translation is unbearably inadequate, you may make better sense of it, if you consult with the original German text. The companion piece to Negative Dialectics is Adorno's Prism. Get Prism first, and wait for a better translation of ND.

Michel Foucault once stated that it was a great tragedy that the Frankfurt School and the French post-structuralists were unaware of each other's work. He felt that the two schools of thought could have gained much from dialogue, and this text illustrates his point in its relatedness to postmodern discourses on the limits of knowledge and the ends of positivistic philosophy.

Adorno addresses the relationship between the concept and the nonconceptualities, which is nothing more that the relationship between discourse and the Other in post-structuralist phraseology. The text is extraordinarily difficult - not always a problem explainable via the difficulties of the ideas involved - and I often find myself spending an hour reading and re-reading a page or two before being able to come to terms with the content. Personally, I enjoy such difficult reading, however, and find it an avenue for developing critical reasoning skills at the sime time as I re-investigate the problems addressed in the difficult prose.

I highly recommend this text for anyone interested in pessemistic, carefully thought-out discourses on the limits placed on understanding by the "pigeon-holeing" of conceptualization, anyone who enjoys cracking hard nuts via time, sweat, and frustration, and anyone looking for a difficult text to read superficially and criticize emptily as being an example of the poverty of post WWII continental philosophy. In a sense, it is a book for all . . .

Just a note re. several reviewers' very sensible suggestion to wait for a better trans. before reading Negative Dialectics. Seems to me that ND is just too important to TWA's oeuvre; Ashton's trans. is bad, but is it bad enough to delay one from reading ND? Those of us who thought we'd never really need German owe R. Hullot-Kentor _a lot_ for all the insight, skill, and just plain drudgery he put into his Eng. trans. of _Aesthetic Theory_. Others may be better informed and know something about a forthcoming, new _ND_ trans., as in a complete reworking like what RH-K did for AT. (All I've noticed is a reissue of the same Ashton trans.: the biggest improvement is the new cover--no more sickly green monochrome.) An alternative strategy for ND--along lines others have suggested, too: read LOTS of Adorno in good translations--choosing texts based your own interests as well as some consideration to the must-reads (for music, I'd emphatically recommend the vol. of essays edited by Richard Leppert; alternating "Adorno heavy" and "Adorno lite" [yes, these are relative terms] can make the experience less head-clutching). Also, Fred Jameson, who shares the common opinion of Ashton's _ND_--and, moreover, _actually reads German_--helpfully provides a short list of some of Ashton's "most urgent howlers" (Jameson, _Late Marxism: Adorno . . ._ [Verso, 1990], ix-x--for that matter, if you're interested in Jameson's reading of TWA, his Adorno book presupposes, I think it's fair to say, a pretty fair familiarity w/ _ND_). So I wouldn't suggest waiting on that once & future _really good_ ND trans. Or hedge your bets: break out those old German textbooks, and maybe you'll be reading ND in the original while we of the slothful majority are still keeping the translation vigil.

Addendum: I suspect TWA wouldn't care much for having his work rated by no. of gold stars: translations matter, too, and have to figure into overall evaluations, seems to me. So the constellations Adorno did like combine with the trans. issue and ... 4 stars. We don't get to say anything w/o giving a star rating, no? ???

Philosopher, Sociologist, Musicologist...and the list goes on with the accomplishments of this amazingly creative person. Adorno studied philosophy first (forming a long friendship with Walter Benjamin). He also studied composition with Berg in Vienna. One of this centuries most critical theorists, Adorno brings us thought provoking, difficult conceptualizations of the instrumentalisation of rationality and means for the utilization of art to oppose our modern, repressive society. Negative Dialects -his anti system- is one of his most important works. As stated by earlier reviewers, this oeuvre is best read when you've laid the necessary previous theoretical foundations. Then it's a joy...