Richard Langston

Christian Schulte

Gunther Martens

Vincent Pauval

Rainer Stollmann

Among other titles, Alexander Kluge has been described over the course of the past few decades by colleagues, critics and academics as an encyclopedist, a "chronicler of the century", "narrator of critical theory", or the "only large-scale project developer we have today" (Habermas). Such titles are merely endeavours to find a term to cover the whole interdisciplinary gamut of his works (running from literary, to film, theoretical and televisual work), which over more than five decades have developed a rhizomatic structure that is difficult to keep track of, even for authorities on Kluge.The Alexander Kluge Yearbook attempts to remedy this situation. Through the publication of new texts, it reflectsthe continued development of the history of his oeuvre, bringing together the results of international Kluge research, presenting documents from earlier periods and thus offering insight into the way he works. Each volume will contain, finally, an updated bibliography (of primary and research literature) and videography (of DCTP productions).

Vermischte Nachrichten

Flaschenpost war Adornos resignative Metapher aus dem Jahr 1940 für die eingebüßte Wirkungsmacht der Kritischen Theorie im Exil. Echos einer Flasche heißt für Kluge die bescheidene Optik – etwas indirekt im Glassplitter sehen – womit er wirksame Perspektiven im globalisierten 21. Jahrhundert sucht. Der zweite Band des Kluge-Jahrbuchs widmet sich einerseits Kluges theoretischer Verwandlung am Beispiel seiner Theoriearbeit mit Oskar Negt und andererseits den multimedialen Sichtweisen, die nicht nur seine »Haltung der Bescheidenheit« zum Ausdruck bringen, sondern auch seine theoretischen Wurzeln offenlegen.

Echoes of a Message in a Bottle

Glass Shards

"Adorno characterized Critical Theory as a message in a bottle in 1940 when the exiled Frankfurt School's sphere of influence was an ocean away from the catastrophes of fascism it sought to fight. Turning Adorno's metaphor on its head some six decades later, Kluge likens his creative method in the interview with Oskar Negt that opens the second volume of the Kluge-Jahrbuch to echoes of light refracted through a bottle: 'I can also see something by looking through shards of glass, ' he explains. Deploying this turn of phrase as its point of departure, this issue of the Jahrbuch devotes its attention first to Kluge's theory work written with Negt, its roots in and adaptation of the Frankfurt School tradition as well as its indebtedness to other schools of thought. In the remainder of the volume, scholars working in five different disciplines across the humanities query Kluge's ways of seeing in film, television and literature.

Vincent Pauval

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