Horkheimer returned to Germany because German is uniquely suited to speculative philosophy

Evidence

The decision to return to Germany was hardly motivated by simple subjective needs, by homesickness, as little as I can deny that. There was also an objective reason. That is language. Not merely because one can never express as exactly in a new language what one means, with all the nuances and the rhythms of the train of thought, as in one’s own. Rather, the German language has a special elective affinity JWahlverwandischaftJ to philosophy, and, to be sure, to its speculative moment.” — Martin Jay, The Dialectical Imagination, 851

Categorization

• DEFINE: Wahlverwandischaft (elective affinity) is the Goethean term, itself borrowed from chemistry, describing the attraction that led Horkheimer back to the German language for philosophy.
• XREF: Echoes the linguistic turn/Heideggerian idea of language housing Being, and contrasts with Adorno’s famous resistance to English; connects to broader debates about German as the natural tongue of philosophy. — connects to: Adorno and Horkheimer returned to Germany expecting greater practical impact.