CONTRADICTION, CRITIQUE, AND DIALECTIC IN ADORNO A ...

echen: Ihre eigene, die rücksichtslose, gut spekulative Theorie. Es ist deren
Anliegen allein, das ich gegen Sie anmelde. 411
The difference between Adorno and Benjamin boils down to their disagreement
not over the philosophy of language or the method of constellations in its macro-
structure, but rather in the fact that Adorno argues that the method requires dialectical
mediation—it must contain systematic dialectics at its “Glutkern” [the “fiery core,”
translated by Walker as “glowing heart”], 412 as the force by which the fragments that are
arranged in the constellation are held together internally and constitute a monadic
expression of the social totality—whereas Benjamin simply juxtaposed natural-historical
and social-materialist images without interweaving them dialectically. The difference, I
propose, is ultimately based in the fact that Adorno conceives of social reality as really
and concretely ordered in accordance with a systematic totality, with an internal
teleological structure (see chapter 6), and therefore in need of a Hegelian-dialectical
approach—even if this approach is not self-sufficient but is rather located by critical
thought at the Glutkern of natural-history. Benjamin does not have the Hegelian-
411 Lonitz, Henri, ed. Theodor W. Adorno: Briefe und Briefwechsel, Vol. 1 (Frankfurt Suhrkamp,
1994), 368. English translation in Lonitz, Henri, ed., trans. Walker, Nicholas, Theodor W. Adorno and
Walter Benjamin: The Complete Correspondence 1928-1940 (Cambridge, Polity Press, 1999), 283:
The ‘mediation’ which I miss and find obscured by materialistic-historiographical evocation, is
simply the theory which your study has omitted. But the omission of theory affects the empirical
material itself. On the one hand, this omission lends the material a deceptively epic character, and
on the other it deprives the phenomena, which are experienced merely subjectively, of their real
historico-philosophical weight. To express this another way: the theological motif of calling
things by their names tends to switch into the wide-eyed presentation of mere facts. If one wanted
to put it rather drastically, one could say that your study is located at the crossroads of magic and
positivism. This spot is bewitched. Only theory could break this spell—your own resolute and
salutarily speculative theory. It is simply the claim of this theory that I bring against you here.
412 Lonitz, Henri, ed. Theodor W. Adorno: Briefe und Briefwechsel, Vol. 1 (Frankfurt Suhrkamp,
1994), 143. English translation in Lonitz, Henri, ed., trans. Walker, Nicholas, Theodor W. Adorno and
Walter Benjamin: The Complete Correspondence 1928-1940 (Cambridge, Polity Press, 1999), 108.
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