Theodor Adorno
Theodor Adorno
Theodor W. Adornowas a German philosopher, sociologist, and composer known for his critical theory of society...
NationalityGerman
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth11 September 1903
CountryGermany
dream vegetables outcomes
In the nineteenth century the Germans painted their dream and the outcome was invariably vegetable. The French needed only to paint a vegetable and it was already a dream.
political levels way
It is one of the basic tenets of fascist leadership to keep primary libidinal energy on an unconscious level so as to divert its manifestations in a way suitable to political ends.
revenge independent home
Thus is order ensured: some have to play the game because they cannot otherwise live, and those who could live otherwise are kept out because they do not want to play the game. It is as if the class from which independent intellectuals have defected takes its revenge, by pressing its demands home in the very domain where the deserter seeks refuge.
writing ends
In the end, the writer is not even allowed to live in his writing.
joy kitsch shameless
In the end indignation over kitsch is anger at tis shameless revelling in the joy of imitation.
hygiene irrelevance dying
So the experience of death is turned into that of the exchange of functionaries, and anything in the natural relationship to death that is not wholly absorbed into the social one is turned over to hygiene. In being seen as no more than the exit of a living creature from the social combine, death has been domesticated: dying merely confirms the absolute irrelevance of the natural organism in face of the social absolute.
true-life
There is no true life within a false life.
order evil hatred
The creed of evil has been, since the beginnings of highly industrialized society, not only a precursor of barbarism but a mask of good. The worth of the latter was transferred to the evil that drew to itself all the hatred and resentment of an order which drummed good into its adherents so that it could with impunity be evil.
jargon determined individual
What is or is not the jargon is determined by whether the word is written in an intonation which places it transcendently in opposition to its own meaning; by whether the individual words are loaded at the expense of the sentence, its propositional force, and the thought content.
hate tradition oneself
One must have tradition in oneself, to hate it properly.
sublime steps ridiculous
The sublime is only a step removed from the ridiculous.
nature use humans
What human beings seek to learn from nature is how to use it to dominate wholly both it and human beings. Nothing else counts.
underdog splendid ends
In the end, glorification of splendid underdogs is nothing other than glorification of the splendid system that makes them so.
birthday being-yourself inspire
In the age of the individual's liquidation, the question of individuality must be raised anew.