The Summer of Theory

'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.

Introduction: What Was Theory?1965: The Hour of Theory1. Federal Republic of AdornoReflections from Damaged LifeCulture After Working HoursIn the Literary SupermarketAdorno AnswersAre Your Endeavours Aimed at Changing the World?2. In the Suhrkamp CultureNew LeftistsHe Didn't WriteSchool of Hard BooksPaperback TheoryBirth of a Genre1970: Endless Discussions3. Ill-made BooksTheoretical PracticeSmash Bourgeois Copyright!Mondays, Fridays and SundaysThe Disorder of Discourse4. Wolfsburg EmpireProletarian Public SphereIn the Land of Class StruggleThe Lightness of Being CommunistA Fateful Stroke of Luck1977: Reading French in the German Autumn5. (Possible) Reasons for the Happiness of ThoughtAll Kinds of EscapesIntensity Is Not a FeelingThe Laugh of MerveVague Thinkers6. The Reader as PartisanThe Death of the AuthorThe Pleasure of the TextChildren's BooksA Different Mode of ProductionLying on Water7. Foucault and the TerroristsA Schweppes in ParisPolitical TouristsVerminOn Tunix Beach1984: The End of History8. Critique of Pure TextThe Master ThinkersAdults OnlySola ScripturaAesthetics of Counter-EnlightenmentA Little Materialism9. Into the White CubeThe Mountain of TruthBe Smart - Take PartGerman IssuesThe Island of PosthistoireThe Trouble with Duchamp10. Prussianism and SpontaneismWar in the Time of Total PeaceMachiavelli in WestphaliaThe Wild AcademyIn Search of the PunctumJacob Taubes's Best Enemy11. Disco DispositiveTyrannies of IntimacyPub BlatherThe Art of Having a BeerIn the JungleAbove the CloudsEpilogue: After Theory?BibliographyAppendix: Translations of IllustrationsNotesIndex