Adorno rejected Benjamin’s philological method as trapped between magic and positivism.
Evidence
In a subsequent letter to Benjamin in November, Adorno expressed his continued disappointment with the progress of the essay on Baudelaire and Paris. Here he spelled out his objections to Benjamin’s theological and philological approach as undialectical. “One can express it thus,” he wrote. “The theological motive to name things by their names tends to be transformed into the astounding presentation of simple facticity. If one wants to speak drastically, one could say the work has settled in a crossroads between magic and positivism. This spot is bewitched. Only theory can break the spell: your own merciless, good, speculative theory.” — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 620
Categorization
- XREF: The Adorno-Benjamin debate over magic/positivism foreshadows the same tension in the positivism dispute of the 1960s with Popper. — connects to: Adorno dismissed Benjamin’s stance as a psychodynamic defense mechanism. — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 1515; Adorno rejected Benjamin’s equation of commodity with the archaic — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination: A History…, 617; Adorno rejects causal-genetic and ideal-typical models of the commodity-form relationship. — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 330 (+4 more)
Broader Connections
- Adorno dismissed Benjamin’s stance as a psychodynamic defense mechanism.
#expands(0.75) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 1515 - Adorno broke with Benjamin by denying even a weak messianic power to history
#expands(0.72) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 837 - Adorno rejected Benjamin’s equation of commodity with the archaic
#expands(0.70) — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 617 - Adorno rejects causal-genetic and ideal-typical models of the commodity-form relationship.
#expands(0.70) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 330