Theodor W. Adorno
German philosopher and critic
Theodor W. Adorno (1903-1969) was a German philosopher, cultural critic and music critic. He belonged to the Frankfurt School and wrote Dialectic of Enlightenment.
1 summary 18 min of listening
Born 1903 in Frankfurt, Germany Died 1969
Influenced by Walter Benjamin, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Max Weber
About Theodor W. Adorno
Theodor W. Adorno was born Theodor Ludwig Wiesengrund in Frankfurt on 11 September 1903 and died on 6 August 1969. He worked as a philosopher and critic of culture and music, and he held a prominent place among the thinkers of the Frankfurt School. He was trained as a classical musician and studied composition with Alban Berg. During the Second World War he lived in California as an exile, where he worked with Thomas Mann on the novel Doctor Faustus. He also worked at the Institute for Social Research, taking part in studies of authoritarianism, antisemitism and propaganda. His books include Dialectic of Enlightenment, Minima Moralia and Negative Dialectics. After returning to Frankfurt, he debated Karl Popper on positivist science and criticized Martin Heidegger's language of authenticity. His Aesthetic Theory was published after his death, and he was nominated for the 1965 Nobel Prize in Literature.