Introductory description

The module will explore the materialist critique of bourgeois aesthetics by Walter Benjamin, Bertolt Brecht, Georg Lukàcs and Theodor W.Adorno. All four thinkers ascribe an epistemological value to art and develop a philosophical framework within which modern literature is supposed to fulfil a revolutionary function.

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

1. Benjamin: "The Work of Art in the Age of its Mechanical Reproducibility"
2. Benjamin: "The Work of Art in the Age of its Mechanical Reproducibility"
3. Benjamin: "On Some Motifs in Baudelaire"
4. Benjamin: "Theses on the Philosophy of History"
5. Benjamin: "Theses on the Philosophy of History"
6. Brecht: "St. Joan of the Stockyards", excerpts from 'Brecht on Theatree'
7. Brecht: "Mother Courage", " A Short Organum for the Theatre"
8. Lukacs: "Realism in the Balance" and Brecht: "Against Georg Lukacs" (from 'Aesthetics and Politics')
9. Adorno: "Commitment" and "Reconciliation under duress" (from 'Aesthetics and Politiks')
10. Adorno: "Cultural Criticism and Society", Paul Celan: Poems (copies provided)

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• By the end of the course students will have gained insight into the complex relation between politics and aesthetics with respect to four influential thinkers/writers during the period of high modernism. Students will have familiarized themselves with central political, aesthetic and philosophical questions of the period of German high modernism because they will have studied in depth some of the essential theoretical and aesthetic texts addressing the problem of modernity, especially in relation to the rise of German fascism. Because all of the texts attempt to develop a political aesthetics as a means of dealing with modernity, Students will have had to address and reflect upon key aspects of modernist aesthetics and their philosophical and political foundations and will have achieved a deeper understanding of them. The combination of theoretical texts and literary manifestations means that students will have had to problematise and reflect upon the relationship between theory and praxis as regards a (political) aesthetics.

Indicative reading list

Walter Benjamin: Illuminations, Fontana
Understanding Brecht, Verso
Aesthetics & Politics: Debates between Ernst Bloch/Georg Lukacs/Bertol Brecht/
Walter Benjamin/Theodor Adorno, Verso
Bertolt Brecht: St Joan of the Staockyards in: Brecht: Collected Plays 3ii, Methuen
Bertolt Brecht: Mother Courage and her Children, Methuen
John Willet (ed.), Brecht on Theatre, Methuen

Subject specific skills

To be added

Transferable skills

An ability to understand and assess complex arguments. An ability to read texts carefully and with intelligence. An ability to enter sympathetically into a different way of thinking and to assess its merits from an internal vantage point. An ability to explain complex ideas to others.