This is beyond wonderful. As a student of literature 50 some years ago I discovered the Frankfurt school, and was besotted. Adorno seemed to write in such coherent fragments which gave rise to such insights. Benjamin likewise. But I had not heard of Kluge till now. Gave up academia half way through a phd and went home to Shetland where my beloved English wife took up my parents crofts and raised sheep and cows.i never felt any attraction to postmodernism or all the French thinkers. But I never came across Kluge till now. I am besotted again! Thankyou very much
This post exemplifies the main reason why I love subscribing to and reading Chartbook (of course I also come here to learn something, just as I do whilst listening to Ones and Tooze-episodes and very obviously I enjoy discoveries in art and poetry but THIS is really interesting and topic-wise "right up my alley" so to speak) - thanks!
Your article reminds me of the 4 repeated American generational archetypes -- each influenced by their generational bookends and vertical place in history -- that Bill Strauss and Neil Howe described in "Generations." It's really a seminal work and the prediction it made in the 1980s about the rise of Trump are uncanny. https://www.amazon.com/Generations-History-Americas-Future-1584/dp/0688119123
What an utterly delicious gift to find this in my mail this morning. I am enriched for the year. Huge gratitude for such a generous response to Kluge's life and work. Thank you.
Just a side note, however, on Klee's drawing Angelus Novus / The Angel of History... you probably know, but it might be of interest to others: Benjamin purchased the drawing in 1921 and it went with him to France in 1933. When he fled France in 1933 he left it with Georges Bataille for safekeeping, who sequestered it secretly in the Bibliotheque Nationale where he was working. After the war Bataille gave it to Theodor Adorno, who in turn got it to Gershom Scholem in Palestine, as per Benjamin's will. A narrative talisman almost of the themes in your post.
This is the most Kluge I've ever read, though I have a copy of his Stalingrad book around here somewhere, waiting to be opened.
As you are likely aware, Kluge was also a superb filmmaker. I highly recommend his prescient science-fiction satire Der große Verhau (The Big Mess, 1971), Der starke Ferdinand (Strongman Ferdinand, 1976), and the truly magnificent WWIII anthology Krieg und Frieden (War and Peace, 1982). And he made some terrific shorts, too, including his searing Thomas Edison critique Hinrichtung eines Elefanten (2000).
Adam, unrelated but you should check out a new documentary on the film circuit in the U.K.: Oliver Tambo’s London Recruits.
It’s about the efforts of predominantly young brits going over to SA when the ANC were in exile. What was amazing to me is how many were working-class (non-political electricians feeling moved enough to essentially go and spy there etc). Impossible to comprehend the plurality of political views amongst the working class then compared to now.
Hierarchy of needs thanks to globalisation? Probably a wishful, benign reading…
In reading this, I find myself look through a lens that magnifies a concave mirror that reflects another lens carrying the images from a prism reflecting more than many.... A single human never makes the whole, and even a historian cannot make a single purpose out of humanity. So much here on which to cogitate. Many thanks! But I still need to get out and fix the bee equipment. No matter what my mind wants, the season is on us, the time is now. If I wait, I fail. And the bees I have enticed to stay, what of them? Questions, questions...
The story of the two truck drivers’ careful negotiations is beautiful, and how they then mistreat their wives. A microcosm of the infinite possibilities and outcomes of our interactions. At the end all that matters is, ‘What and who do I really care about? More than anything?’
Adam Tooze's tearful tribute to Alexander Kluge tells us everything we need to know. Kluge spent decades waging cultural war on the West.
While Americans built families, churches, and communities rooted in faith and tradition, Kluge and his circle deconstructed reality itself, attacked the nuclear family, mocked bourgeois morality, and promoted a fractured, relativistic worldview that dissolves national identity and Christian order.
This is Cultural Marxism in action: the long march through our institutions that has left our civilization hollowed out and ashamed of its own heritage. Tooze calls him a 'comfort.' For those who still love the old America, his passing is no tragedy... just another milestone in the slow suicide of the West.
This is beyond wonderful. As a student of literature 50 some years ago I discovered the Frankfurt school, and was besotted. Adorno seemed to write in such coherent fragments which gave rise to such insights. Benjamin likewise. But I had not heard of Kluge till now. Gave up academia half way through a phd and went home to Shetland where my beloved English wife took up my parents crofts and raised sheep and cows.i never felt any attraction to postmodernism or all the French thinkers. But I never came across Kluge till now. I am besotted again! Thankyou very much
This post exemplifies the main reason why I love subscribing to and reading Chartbook (of course I also come here to learn something, just as I do whilst listening to Ones and Tooze-episodes and very obviously I enjoy discoveries in art and poetry but THIS is really interesting and topic-wise "right up my alley" so to speak) - thanks!
Your article reminds me of the 4 repeated American generational archetypes -- each influenced by their generational bookends and vertical place in history -- that Bill Strauss and Neil Howe described in "Generations." It's really a seminal work and the prediction it made in the 1980s about the rise of Trump are uncanny. https://www.amazon.com/Generations-History-Americas-Future-1584/dp/0688119123
Rob Quartel
more,more,we want more
I guess I didn't understand more than half of this, at best, but I still learned a lot, thank you.
What an utterly delicious gift to find this in my mail this morning. I am enriched for the year. Huge gratitude for such a generous response to Kluge's life and work. Thank you.
Just a side note, however, on Klee's drawing Angelus Novus / The Angel of History... you probably know, but it might be of interest to others: Benjamin purchased the drawing in 1921 and it went with him to France in 1933. When he fled France in 1933 he left it with Georges Bataille for safekeeping, who sequestered it secretly in the Bibliotheque Nationale where he was working. After the war Bataille gave it to Theodor Adorno, who in turn got it to Gershom Scholem in Palestine, as per Benjamin's will. A narrative talisman almost of the themes in your post.
This is the most Kluge I've ever read, though I have a copy of his Stalingrad book around here somewhere, waiting to be opened.
As you are likely aware, Kluge was also a superb filmmaker. I highly recommend his prescient science-fiction satire Der große Verhau (The Big Mess, 1971), Der starke Ferdinand (Strongman Ferdinand, 1976), and the truly magnificent WWIII anthology Krieg und Frieden (War and Peace, 1982). And he made some terrific shorts, too, including his searing Thomas Edison critique Hinrichtung eines Elefanten (2000).
Adam, unrelated but you should check out a new documentary on the film circuit in the U.K.: Oliver Tambo’s London Recruits.
It’s about the efforts of predominantly young brits going over to SA when the ANC were in exile. What was amazing to me is how many were working-class (non-political electricians feeling moved enough to essentially go and spy there etc). Impossible to comprehend the plurality of political views amongst the working class then compared to now.
Hierarchy of needs thanks to globalisation? Probably a wishful, benign reading…
In reading this, I find myself look through a lens that magnifies a concave mirror that reflects another lens carrying the images from a prism reflecting more than many.... A single human never makes the whole, and even a historian cannot make a single purpose out of humanity. So much here on which to cogitate. Many thanks! But I still need to get out and fix the bee equipment. No matter what my mind wants, the season is on us, the time is now. If I wait, I fail. And the bees I have enticed to stay, what of them? Questions, questions...
The story of the two truck drivers’ careful negotiations is beautiful, and how they then mistreat their wives. A microcosm of the infinite possibilities and outcomes of our interactions. At the end all that matters is, ‘What and who do I really care about? More than anything?’
Germanic drivel, all of it.
One of your best, most beautiful, heart-felt essays. Inspiring. Thank you.
hoo boy!
This is fascinating. Now that I am retiring I might find time to read Kluge
Adam Tooze's tearful tribute to Alexander Kluge tells us everything we need to know. Kluge spent decades waging cultural war on the West.
While Americans built families, churches, and communities rooted in faith and tradition, Kluge and his circle deconstructed reality itself, attacked the nuclear family, mocked bourgeois morality, and promoted a fractured, relativistic worldview that dissolves national identity and Christian order.
This is Cultural Marxism in action: the long march through our institutions that has left our civilization hollowed out and ashamed of its own heritage. Tooze calls him a 'comfort.' For those who still love the old America, his passing is no tragedy... just another milestone in the slow suicide of the West.
Wow, this looks really interesting, thank you.