The Summer of Theory
History of a Rebellion, 1960-1990
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- $24.99
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- $24.99
Publisher Description
‘Theory’ – a magical glow has emanated from this word since the sixties. Theory was more than just a succession of ideas: it was an article of faith, a claim to truth, a lifestyle. It spread among its adherents in cheap paperbacks and triggered heated debates in seminar rooms and cafés. The Frankfurt School, Structuralism, Post-Structuralism, Adorno, Derrida, Foucault: these and others were the exotic schools and thinkers whose ideas were being devoured by young minds. But where did the fascination for dangerous thoughts come from?
In his magnificently written book, Philipp Felsch follows the hopes and dreams of a generation that entered the jungle of difficult texts. His setting is West Germany in the decades from the 1960s to the 1990s: in a world frozen in the Cold War, movement only came from big ideas. It was the time of apocalyptic master thinkers, upsetting reading experiences and glamorous incomprehensibility. As the German publisher Suhrkamp published Adorno’s Minima Moralia and other High Theory works of the Frankfurt School, a small publisher in West Berlin, Merve Verlag, provided readers with a steady stream of the subversive new theory coming out of France.
By following the adventures of the publishers who provided the books and the reading communities that consumed and debated them, Philipp Felsch tells the remarkable story of an intellectual revolt when the German Left fell in love with Theory.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Germany in the 1960s, "theory was more than just a succession of intellectual ideas: it was a claim of truth, an article of faith and a lifestyle accessory," writes historian Felsch in his fascinating English-language debut. When Germany was first confronting its dark legacy from WWII, a revolution in critical theory was in the making, Felsch notes, and people became captivated with emerging philosophers and their philosophies. Felsch sheds light on how avant-garde publishers were instrumental in introducing German readers to French critical theory, notably the works of Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault, Félix Guattari, and Claude Levi-Strauss. He moves beyond the history of ideas to document the wider impact of the movement on German society, as the pub scene evolved and bars attracted different milieux with various philosophical bents. Felsch appealingly blends social and intellectual history, and his prose shines when he writes about his own encounters with critical theory: "I read more than I have ever read since... in the heat of the Italian summer, the ‘microphysics of power' and the ‘iceberg of history' stuck to my forearms." Impassioned and full of detail, this is a fascinating snapshot of the period.
