Late Marxism: Adorno, Or, The Persistence of the Dialectic (Radical Thinkers)

In the name of an assault on €œtotalization€ and €œidentity,€ a number of contemporary theorists have been busily washing Marxism€s dialectical and utopian projects down the plug-hole of postmodernism and €œpost-politics.€ A case in point is recent interpretation of one of the greatest twentieth-century philosophers, Theodor Adorno. In this powerful book, Fredric Jameson proposes a radically different reading of Adorno€s work, especially of his major works on philosophy and aesthetics: Negative Dialectics and Aesthetic Theory.

Jameson argues persuasively that Adorno€s contribution to the development of Marxism remains unique and indispensable. He shows how Adorno€s work on aesthetics performs deconstructive operations yet is in sharp distinction to the now canonical deconstructive genre of writing. He explores the complexity of Adorno€s very timely affirmation of philosophy €" of its possibility after the €œend€ of grand theory. Above all, he illuminates the subtlety and richness of Adorno€s continuing emphasis on late capitalism as a totality within the very forms of our culture. In its lucidity, Late Marxism echoes the writing of its subject, to whose critical, utopian intelligence Jameson remains faithful.