SOURCE: “Autonomy of Art: Looking Back at Adorno's Ästhetische Theorie,”¹ in German Quarterly, Vol. 54, No. 2, March, 1981, pp. 133-48.

In the following essay, Hohendahl examines critical response to the publication of Adorno's Ästhetische Theorie.

Theodor Adorno's major contribution to the philosophy of art, his Ästhetische Theorie, appeared in 1970.² The work was almost completed when the author died in 1969. Adorno meant to rewrite the introduction, but otherwise the text needed only formal revisions, which were carried out by Rolf Tiedemann, Adorno's faithful disciple and editor. Tiedemann rightly felt that Ästhetische Theorie deserved immediate publication since it was the legacy of Critical Theory. Yet it was precisely this aspect which marred the reception of the book. Except for a few voices in the liberal and conservative camp, the response was surprisingly negative. One might have expected that the East German critics would denounce Adorno's theory as a typical example of Western...