La promesse du bonheur en los inicios de la teoría crítica: Adorno, Marcuse y una controversia sobre estética materialista

Abstract

This paper analyzes two different ways in
which Stendhal’s notion of beauty as a
promesse du bonheur was used in the
beginning of Critical Theory. First of all, we
concentrate on the appropriation of the notion
developed by H. Marcuse in the context of his
critique to affirmative culture. Secondly, we
refer to Theodor W. Adorno´s use of the
concept in the late 1930s. Both approaches, as
separated
issues,
have
been
widely
investigated. Nevertheless, we find fewer
investigations aiming to link them in the
context of intellectual disputes within the
Institut für Sozialforschung. In order to
account for this linkage, first we analyze
Marcuse´s article "Über den affirmativen
Charakter der Kultur" where that notion of
beauty appears [1]. Later, we present Adorno’s
reaction to this essay [2] and inquire into the
outbreak of the idea of art as a promesse du
bonheur in his own work [3]. Finally, we
explore the way in which a dialectical
relationship between the genuine promise of
art and the vicarious promises of the culture
industry is assayed by Adorno [4]. With this
reconstruction, we seek to understand Adorno's
definition of advanced art as promesse du
bonheur as a critical response to Marcuse´s
work. Moreover, we intend to show that it is in
this idea where Adorno finds the main points
for broadening the materialist aesthetics inside
the Institut.