Gyorgy Lukacs – författare

Engaged with questions of realist and modernist world-views in art, the relations of literary history to politics and the role of cultural intellectuals in public life, this book of essays collects some of Lukacs' most influential writings. Translated into English for the first time, these pieces offer a new look at one of the most significant Marxist thinkers of the 20th century.

In 1973, an employee of the Deutsche Bank in Heidelberg identified the influential sociologist of literature and Marxist György Lukács (1885–1971) as the owner of a mass of material that had been deposited there in 1917. Among the sixteen hundred letters and text fragments of the collection, known as the "Heidelberg Suitcase" among researchers, was the notebook that has been partially reproduced in this publication. The content of the notebook is in two parts: In the front are notes Lukács took in German during lectures by Georg Simmel on "Logic and Problems of Contemporary Philosophy," held at the Berlin University in 1906. A few years later, Lukács used the notebook again and, starting from its end, wrote in Hungarian a draft with the title "Sociology of Art."With an introduction by Lívia Páldi, Chief Curator at the Mucsarnok/Kunsthalle Budapest and Agent for dOCUMENTA (13). Language: German/English

1973 identifizierte ein Mitarbeiter der Deutschen Bank in Heidelberg den einflussreichen Literatursoziologen und Marxisten György Lukács (1885–1971) als den Besitzer eines dort seit 1917 hinterlegten Materialkonvoluts. Unter den ca. 1.600 Briefen und Textfragmenten in der als »Heidelberger Koffer« in die Forschung eingegangenen Sammlung befand sich auch das Notizbuch, das in dieser Publikation in Ausschnitten reproduziert ist. Der Inhalt des Notizbuches besteht aus zwei Teilen: Der vordere Teil ist die deutsche Mitschrift einer 1906 von Georg Simmel an der Berliner Universität gehaltenen Vorlesung zum Thema »Logik und Probleme der Philosophie der Gegenwart«. Einige Jahre später nutzte Lukács das Notizbuch weiter und schrieb in ungarischer Sprache, von der letzten Seite beginnend, eine Skizze mit dem Titel »Kunstsoziologie« nieder.   Mit einer Einführung von Lívia Páldi, Chefkuratorin am Mucsarnok/Kunsthalle Budapest und Agentin der dOCUMENTA (13).    Sprache: Deutsch/Englisch

Filósofo húngaro, político y crítico literario, György Lukács (1885-1971) es considerado uno de los intelectuales marxistas más influyentes del siglo pasado. Marcado por la filosofía de Kant y Weber, su obra, fundamental para la interpretación de las teorías de clase y la alienación del trabajo, influiría en el pensamiento de grandes figuras de la política del siglo XX como Ernesto Che Guevara. La ontología del ser social es una obra que no sólo renueva la tradición de la gran filosofía clásica, sino que también permite extender los intereses filosóficos a ramas de la ciencia que se habían mantenido al margen en la reflexión filosófica contemporánea. Ningún otro filósofo, antes que Lukács, ha colocado tan fuertemente el énfasis sobre el trabajo como principio de hominización. La presente traducción se ha realizado del original en alemán de su obra póstuma La ontología del ser social.

When the Hungarian Marxist philosopher and literary critic Gyorgy Lukacs returned to Hungary from Moscow after World War II, he engaged in a highly active phase of writing and speaking about the democratic culture needed to exorcise the remnants of fascism and to create the conditions for the advance of socialism in Central Europe. His essays of the period, including the influential volume Literature and Democracy, appear here for the first time in English translation. Engaged with questions of realist and modernist world-views in art, the relations of literary history to politics and social history, and the role of cultural intellectuals in public life, these essays offer a new look at one of the most influential Marxist thinkers of the twentieth century.

How is it possible that works of art exist? How do we become receptive aesthetic subjects? The Specificity of the Aesthetic extends these fundamental ontological and phenomenological questions around which Georg Lukacs's theory of art was organised. This late work of aesthetics seeks to solve a puzzle that neither philosophy nor socialist politics was able to: the fundamental ethical question of what individuals and humanity as a whole ought to do. Art offers Lukacs the already-existing means through which the damaged edifice of Marxism might be reconstructed on a durable basis on which to rest the philosophy, politics, and ethics of a non-Soviet-style Marxism.