Adorno e Kierkegaard

Abstract

To speak of the relationship between two thinkers, one of whom produced an interpretation of the other, means doing two things. On one hand, we must examine this interpretation, exposing the assumptions of the interpreter, his cultural a priories, his ideological conditionings. On the other, we must investigate to what extent the interpreter himself was influenced, in his later works, by the ideas he uncovered in the interpreted. This is the exemplary case of Adorno and Kierkegaard. Adorno interpreted Kierkegaard according to a very particular Marxist viewpoint. Our task here is to examine the validity of such analysis. The reverse movement is then required, i.e., to seek in Adorno's works echoes of Kierkegaard's thinking. In the first case, Kierkegaard is the object of the interpretation; in the second, he is the source for a general interpretation of critical theory. We have tried to examine both aspects of this dialectics.