Adorno: A Critical Reader

by Andrew N. Rubin (Editor), Nigel C. Gibson (Editor)

"There is a kind of poetic justice in the fact that Adorno is the great survivor of the Frankfurt School, the only one whose thought retained its full actuality. However, the same thing he said for psychoanalysis – that its truth resides in its very exaggerations – goes for his own thought: he is at his most subversive when he gets involved in a deadlock. For this reason, this critical reader, focused on these deadlocks, is not just a commentary on his thought, but literally part of it. In short, this book is simply a must!"
Slavoj Zizek, Kulturwissenschaftliches Institute, Essen


"Against all odds, Adorno has emerged at the dawn of the twenty-first century as arguably the leading theoretical inspiration of our time. These stimulating essays, written by fresh as well as familiar commentators on his oeuvre, go a long way towards explaining the power of his ideas and demonstrating their abiding relevance."
Martin Jay, University of California, Berkeley

464 pages, Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

Andrew N. Rubin is a Scholar in Residence in English and Comparative Literature at Georgetown University His most recent book is entitled Archives of Authority: Empire, Culture, and the Cold War. Rubin is the co-editor of Adorno: A Critical Reader and the co-editor of The Edward Said Reader. He has written widely on the work of Edward Said, Theodor Adorno, George Orwell, and Joseph Conrad, as well as theories of world literature and transnational modernisms for and journals including Alif: Journal of Comparative Poetics, The South Atlantic Quarterly, The Journal of Palestine Studies, Arab Studies Quarterly, The Nation, The New Statesman, and al-ahram. In 2007, he was the recipient of a Lannan Residency.