The Complete Correspondence 1928 - 1940 E-Book

Theodor W. Adorno

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 818

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

The surviving correspondence between Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno. * * This is the first time all of the surviving correspondence between Adorno and Benjamin has appeared in English. * Provides a key to the personalities and projects of these two major intellectual figures. * Offers a compelling insight into the cultural politics of the period, at a time of social and political upheaval. * An invaluable resource for all students of the work of Adorno and especially of Benjamin, extensively annotated and cross-referenced.

Leseprobe

This edition copyright © Polity Press, 1999. First published in Germany as Briefwechsel 1928-1940 by Suhrkamp Verlag, © 1994.

First published in 1999 by Polity Pressin association with Blackwell Publishers Ltd.

This book is published with the assistance of Inter Nationes.

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ISBN 978-0-7456-3214-8

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Contents

Abbreviations

The Correspondence 1928–1940

1  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 2.7.1928

2  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 1.9.1928

3  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 29.3.1930

4  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 10.11.1930

5  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 17.7.1931

6  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [BERLIN,] 25.7.1931

7  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 31.3.1932

8  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO POVEROMO (MARINA DI MASSA), 3.9.1932

9  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [NO INDICATION OF LOCATION,] 10.11.1932

10  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 1.12.1932

11  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 14.1.1933

12  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 29.1.1934

13  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN BERLIN, 4.3.1934

14  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 9.3.1934

15  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN BERLIN, 13.3.1934

16  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 18.3.1934

17  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN BERLIN, 5.4.1934

18  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 9.4.1934

19  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN FRANKFURT A.M., 13.4.1934

20  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN BROOKLYN (WEST DRAYTON), 21.4.1934

21  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 28.4.1934

22  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 24.5.1934

23  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 6.11.1934

24  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO SAN REMO, 30.11.1934

25  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 5.12.1934

26  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN BERLIN, 16.12.1934

27  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN BERLIN 17.12.1934

28  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO SAN REMO, 7.1.1935

29  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO MONACO-CONDAMINE, [EARLY APRIL 1935]

30  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 1.5.1935

31   WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 20.5.1935

32  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 31.5.1935

33  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 5.6.1935

34  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 8.6.1935

35  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 10.6.1935

36  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 19.6.1935

37  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 5.7.1935

38  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [FRANKFURT A.M., 12.7.1935]

39  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO AND GRETEL KARPLUS TO BENJAMIN HORNBERG, 2–4 AND 5.8.1935

40  BENJAMIN TO GRETEL KARPLUS AND WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [PARIS, 16.8.1935]

41  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 27.12.1935

42  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [FRANKFURT A.M.,] 29.12.1935

43  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [PARIS,] 3.1.1936

44  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN LONDON, 29.1.1936

45  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 7.2.1936

46  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 27.2.1936

47  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN LONDON, 18.3.1936

48  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [PARIS, SUBSEQUENT TO 18.3.1936]

49  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 28.5.1936

50  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 2.6.1936

51  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 4.6.1936

52  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 16.6.1936

53  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 20.6.1936

54  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 30.6.1936

55  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN BERLIN, 6.9.1936

56  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO SAN REMO, 27.9.1936

57  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 15.10.1936

58  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 18.10.1936

59  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 19.10.1936

60  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 26.10.1936

61  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 5.11.1936

62  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 7.11.1936

63  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 28.11.1936

64  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO SAN REMO, 2.12.1936

65  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 29.1.1937

66  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 17.2.1937

67  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 1.3.1937

68  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [PARIS,] 16.3.1937

69  GRETEL KARPLUS AND WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN WÜRZBURG, 31.3.1937

70  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [PARIS,] 13.4.1937

71  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN FRANKFURT A.M., 15.4.1937

72  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 20.4.1937

73  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 23.4.1937

74  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 25.4.1937

75  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 1.5.1937

76  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 4.5.1937

77  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 9.5.1937

78  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 12.5.1937

79  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN OXFORD, 13.5.1937

80  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [PARIS,] 17.5.1937

81  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 15.6.1937

82  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN NEW YORK, 17.6.1937

83  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN ABOARD THE ‘NORMANDIE’, 2.7.1937

84  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO SAN REMO, 10.7.1937

85  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO [SAN REMO, AROUND THE MIDDLE OF JULY 1937]

86  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO SAN REMO, 21.8.1937

87  THEODOR AND GRETEL WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN LONDON, 13.9.1937

88  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN LONDON, 22.9.1937

89  BENJAMIN TO THEODOR AND GRETEL WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 23.9.1937

90  BENJAMIN TO THEODOR AND GRETEL WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BOULOGNE SUR SEINE, 2.10.1937

91  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [LONDON,] 22.10.1937

92  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BOULOGNE SUR SEINE, 2.11.1937

93  BENJAMIN TO THEODOR AND GRETEL WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BOULOGNE SUR SEINE, 17.11.1937

94  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [LONDON,] 27.11.1937

95  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [LONDON,] 1.12.1937

96  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BOULOGNE SUR SEINE, 4.12.1937

97  WIESENGRUND-ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [LONDON,] 1.2.1938

98  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO PARIS, 11.2.1938

99  THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 7.3.1938

100  BENJAMIN TO THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO PARIS, 27.3.1938

101  ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 8.4.1938

102  BENJAMIN TO THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO PARIS, 16.4.1938

103  ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 4.5.1938

104  ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 8.6.1938

105  BENJAMIN TO THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO PARIS, 19.6.1938

106  THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO TO BENJAMIN BAR HARBOR, MAINE, 2.8.1938

107  THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO TO BENJAMIN WRITTEN ON A LETTER FROM MEYER SCHAPIRO TO ADORNO [BAR HARBOR, MAINE, C. 12.8.1938]

108  BENJAMIN TO THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO SKOVSBOSTRAND, 28.8.1938

109  BENJAMIN TO ADORNO SKOVSBOSTRAND, 4.10.1938

110  ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 10.11.1938

111  BENJAMIN TO ADORNO PARIS, 9.12.1938

112  ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 1.2.1939

113  BENJAMIN TO ADORNO PARIS, 23.2.1939

114  THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 15.7.1939

115  BENJAMIN TO THEODOR W. AND GRETEL ADORNO PARIS, 6.8.1939

116  GRETEL AND THEODOR W. ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 21.11.1939

117  ADORNO TO BENJAMIN [NEW YORK,] 29.2.1940

118  BENJAMIN TO ADORNO PARIS, 7.5.1940

119  ADORNO TO BENJAMIN NEW YORK, 16.7.1940

120  BENJAMIN TO ADORNO LOURDES, 2.8.1940

121  BENJAMIN TO HENNY GURLAND [AND ADORNO?] [PORT BOU, 25.9.1940]

Editor’s Afterword by Henri Lonitz

Textual Notes and Source References

Bibliographical Index

Name Index

Abbreviations

Principal works referred to in the annotations of the main text and repeated in the Textual Notes and Source References at the end of the book are abbreviated as follows:

GS [1–20]: Theodor W. Adorno, Gesammelte Schriften, edited by Rolf Tiedemann with the assistance of Gretel Adorno, Susan Buck-Morss and Klaus Schultz. 20 volumes. Frankfurt a.M. 1970–86.

GS [I–VII]: Walter Benjamin, Gesammelte Schriften, edited by Rolf Tiedemann and Hermann Schweppenhäuser with the assistance of Theodor W. Adorno and Gershom Scholem. 7 volumes. Frankfurt a.M. 1972–89.

Adorno, Über Walter Benjamin: Theodor W. Adorno, Über Walter Benjamin. Aufsätze. Artikel. Briefe, annotated by Rolf Tiedemann (revised and expanded edition). Frankfurt a.M. 1990.

Briefwechsel Adorno/Krenek: Theodor W. Adorno and Ernst Krenek, Briefwechsel, edited by Wolfgang Rogge. Frankfurt a.M. 1974.

Briefwechsel Adorno/Sohn-Rethel: Theodor W. Adorno and Alfred Sohn-Rethel, Briefwechsel 1936–1969, edited by Christoph Gödde. Munchen 1991 (Dialektische Studien).

Briefe: Walter Benjamin, Briefe, edited and annotated by Gershom Scholem and Theodor W. Adorno. 2 volumes. 2nd. ed. Frankfurt a.M. 1978.

Briefwechsel Scholem: Walter Benjamin–Gerhsom Scholem, Briefwechsel 1933–1940, edited by Gershom Scholem. Frankfurt a.M. 1980.

Benjamin–Katalog: Walter Benjamin 1892–1940. Eine Ausstellung des Theodor W. Adorno Archivs Frankfurt a.M. in Verbindung mit dem Deutschen Literaturarchiv Marbach am Neckar. Bearbeitet von Rolf Tiedemann, Christoph Gödde und Henri Lonitz. Marbacher Magazin Nr. 55.3. Marbach a.N. 1991.

1  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 2.7.1928

Dear Herr Wiesengrund,

Your cordial lines1 have encouraged me in the pleasant anticipation of receiving your ‘Schubert’ manuscript.2 For that is surely what you allude to. I can only hope that in the meantime you have brought the piece to a successful conclusion. Might I request in advance your permission to communicate the manuscript to Bloch3 as well? It would be a great advantage for me if I could read the text with him.

You showed so much friendliness and support for my friend Alfred Cohn4 that time in Berlin that I feel I really have to inform you about how matters have turned out, or more unfortunately and more precisely, about the liquidation of the business in which he is employed and the consequent loss of his position there. None of this is as yet official – the liquidation of the business is still a commercial secret. But by October his situation will certainly have become extremely difficult, unless his friends are able to intervene on his behalf. In this connection I must and shall now do my best: but that can only succeed if I speak to you again concerning my friend. Naturally I understand that the suggested Berlin arrangement is impossible. Do you not feel there may now be certain possibilities for him in Frankfurt?

I know I have said enough for you to express your friendship and influence once again, if you think there is any prospect of success in the matter.

Here I am, commencing with a request, and then it strikes me that I may seem to have forgotten my intention of inviting Fräulein Karplus5 to drop in on me. But this is not a case of forgetfulness on my part. It is simply that during the last few weeks I have felt so preoccupied with various tasks and predicaments, which have all become dreadfully entangled with one another,6 that I have not had the opportunity to approach her.

As soon as things are better here, very shortly I hope, you will hear from me through her.

With warmest regards for the present,

Yours,Walter Benjamin

2 July 1928

Berlin-Grunewald

Delbrückstr. 23

1Your cordial lines: Adorno and Benjamin had first got to know each other in Frankfurt in 1923 and had subsequently met up once again in Frankfurt, and possibly – in September 1925 – in Naples, to continue their discussions. However, the correspondence between them apparently only began to lead to greater intimacy and communication in the summer of 1928, after Adorno had spent some weeks in Berlin in February of that year – The letters Adorno wrote to Benjamin prior to 1933 were left behind in Benjamin’s last apartment in Berlin when he was finally forced to leave Germany in March 1933 and have all disappeared.

2your ‘Schubert’ manuscript: cf. Adorno, ‘Schubert’, in Die Musik 21, Issue 1 (October 1928), pp. 1–12; now in GS 17, pp. 18–33. – No manuscript of the essay has survived.

3your permission to communicate the manuscript to Bloch: Ernst Bloch, whom Benjamin had known since 1919, had been shown a draft and sketches for the Schubert piece by Adorno and had strongly encouraged the author to complete the essay. (cf. Briefwechsel Adorno/Krenek, p. 70.)

4my friend Alfred Cohn: for Alfred Cohn (1892–1954), a very close school friend of Benjamin, cf. Briefe, p. 866. – Since the beginning of 1928 Benjamin had been attempting to help Cohn, a businessman by profession, to find a new position: ‘He [sc. Benjamin] is also pursuing his aim of getting one of his friends employed in the same business as Gretel [Karplus], and it seems to be working out.’ (Unpublished letter from Adorno to Siegfried Kracauer of 28.2.1928.) The attempts which Adorno made in Frankfurt and Gretel in Berlin – the suggested Berlin arrangement – came to nothing in the end.

5my intention of inviting Fräulein Karplus: Margarete Karplus (1902–1993), later Adorno’s wife, had got to know Benjamin at the beginning of 1928.

6various tasks and predicaments … dreadfully entangled with one another: Benjamin is probably referring here to the resumption of work on the ‘Goethe’ article for the Great Soviet Encyclopaedia (cf. GS II [2], pp. 705–39.) – The heart attack suffered by Benjamin’s mother in July also contributed substantially to the increasing difficulties of Benjamin’s personal situation, largely determined by the conflict between his planned journey to Palestine (cf. Gershom Scholem, Walter Benjamin – die Geschichte einer Freundschaft, 2nd ed. (Frankfurt a.M. 1976), pp. 185–90) and his renewed intimacy with Asja Lacis (cf. ibid., p. 187).

2  BENJAMIN TO WIESENGRUND-ADORNO BERLIN, 1.9.1928

Dear Herr Wiesengrund,

It would prove truly difficult to find an excuse for my long silence. Therefore please take these few lines as a word of explanation. But first I must properly thank you for your manuscript.1

As it happened, I was with Bloch when it arrived and he was so impatient to take the material home with him that, contre cœur, I let him have it. And then, owing to circumstances which suddenly took him away from Berlin, he was unable to find an opportunity to study it or, unfortunately, to return it to me.

And that is why it is only in the last few days that I have managed to reclaim it. But since I should not like to compound this misfortune with another, namely that of reading your ‘Schubert’ all too hastily, I have decided simply to let you know in brief that you may expect a substantive response in a week, together with what I hope will be a rather less formal thank you.

But to deal with the whole humiliating business all at once: the editorial board of ‘The Literary World’ had responded immediately and enthusiastically to my suggestion that they should approach you for the planned contribution to the journal’s George issue.2 They assured me that they would be in contact with you directly. I was foolish enough to believe the whole matter was settled, without reckoning with the infinite incompetence of such organizations. In this regard too I must tender my apologies.

Anticipating more fortunate auspices for the future,

and with cordial regards for now,

Yours,Walter Benjamin

1 September 1928

Berlin-Grunewald

Delbrückstr. 23

Many thanks for everything you have done for my friend. Since the matter is still in progress I shall come back to it if the opportunity arises.