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24 ratings, 4.33 average rating, 5 reviews
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published
September 1998
by Verso
binding
Paperback, 122 pages
isbn
1859841872
(isbn13: 9781859841877)
description
A fascinating study of Germany society on the eve of Nazism. First published in 1930, Siegfried Kracauer's work was greeted with great acclaim and soo...more
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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 40)
Read in February, 2008
This compilation of essays puts together a thorough analysis of cultural forms and seeks to uncloak modernity through reading the aesthetic that it propagates: Kracauer talks about dance, travel, photography and film, and in dialog with arguments that conflate modernity with rationality and reason, he brings forward a new conceptualization of reason that is specific to capitalism, Ratio, and like his Frankfurt School comrades, calls for a true rationalization of the era.
Kracauer's compariso...more
Kracauer's compariso...more
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Read in November, 2007
I was just talking to a friend who agreed that Kracauer's essays should really be taught alongside (if not, I might go so far as to say, instead of) Walter Benjamin's essays as a way of unfolding the critical thought of the Frankfurt School, and its applicability to modern life. Kracauer doesn't suffer by comparison to Benjamin or Adorno, and his work nicely clarifies Benjamin on history and the aura, and complicates Adorno and Horkheimer's thesis on Enlightenment. I'd recommend this to anyone i...more
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Read in January, 2007
yeah, this guy's name is pronounced almost like 'crackwhore.' he wrote about the white collar masses. this is what they did and why they liked to do it, on the eve of national socialism. for a long time - some seventy years - you couldn't read this in english. then everyone demanded that this crackwhore be translated, and so he was. you should rejoice that this crackwhore is accessible to you, too, unless you already understood turgid german. what I mean to say is that it's quite good.
Read in October, 2004
recommends it for:
most anyone interested in dipping their toes in some philosophy.
The beginner's guide to the Frankfurt School! If Adorno spins you round round, baby, round round, like a record, and Benjamin keeps you a-scratchin' your head, this may be your in. Then you can move on to Benji's essays on photography and you'll say "ohhhh, I get it." It's a fun read, as far as German philosophy goes. (How far it goes, may not be too far or far enough for most. Far enough for me.)
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Thomas Levin did a fantastic job in translating and edting these great essays. What would be fascinating is to read these works along with Walter Benjamin. One of the first cultural critics, he really took a look at 'modern life' and gave it a lot of thought to the arts as well as how we look at things. I love essay writing, especially when it connects to pop culture in some form or sense.
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