Authenticity and Impersonality in Adorno's Aesthetics

In: Telos, Heft 117, S. 60-78

Abstract

The aesthetics of Theodor W. Adorno are commonly believed to sympathize only with negative art forms. This reading of Adorno fails to consider Adorno's justification of positive artworks that instigate true reconciliation. A short poem by Morike, On a Hike, meets Adorno's criteria. Not only is it truthful, but it also resists employing linguistic & mental cliches. Likewise, it does not rely on shocking dissonance. Another poem, Goethe's Wanderer's Nightsong, possesses still another of Adorno's specified qualities: authenticity. In short, Adorno has not dismissed art. He has simply determined its rightful place in a contradictory world. K. A. Larsen