Freedom and Negativity in Beckett and Adorno: Something or Nothing [Paperback]

Since his notorious 1961 lecture, 'Trying to Understand Endgame', Theodor W. Adorno's name has been frequently coupled with that of Samuel Beckett. This book offers a radical reappraisal of the intellectual affinities between these two figures, whose paths crossed all too fleetingly. Specifically the book argues for a preoccupation with the concept of freedom in Beckett's works - one which situates him as a profoundly radical and even political writer. Adorno's own more explicit reconceptualization of freedom and its scarcity in modernity offers a unique lens through which to examine the way Beckett's works preserve a minimal space of freedom that acts in opposition to an unfree social totality. While acknowledging both the biographical encounters between Adorno and Beckett and the influence Beckett's writings had on Adorno's aesthetics, Natalie Leeder goes further to establish a dialogue between their intellectual positions, working with a range of texts from both writers and seeking insight in Adorno's less familiar works, as well as his magnum opera, Aesthetic Theory and Negative Dialectics.Natalie Leeder completed her PhD at Royal Holloway, University of London.

Natalie Leeders book stands out through its philosophical sophistication and literary sensitivity. It offers, via the dialogue it creates between Adornos philosophical and Becketts literary work, an exemplary model of how philosophy and literature can interact to illuminate central issues in the modern world. Andrew Bowie, Professor of Philosophy, Royal Holloway, University of London

In a spiritedly polemical and very engaging manner, Leader takes the much discussed but often superficially understood relationship between Theodor Adorno and Samuel Beckett and uses it to redefine current perceptions of Beckett as a political author. Leaders knowledge of the German philosophical tradition goes hand in hand with her sensitive attention to the details of Becketts lesser-known work  from El“%