Adorno's Odyssey: How an Ancient Myth Explains the Logic of War

Theodor W. Adorno, the Frankfurt School philosopher, never explicitly addressed war and peace, but his lifelong engagement with violence and terror, particularly the Holocaust, offers insights into the prevention of military conflict. In a recent article on Freitag, Michael Jaeger explores Adorno's interpretation of Homer's Odyssey, suggesting that the hero's wanderings reveal the logic of violence. Adorno's central concept of "Selbsterhaltung" (self-preservation), rooted in his materialist orientation toward Karl Marx, is key to understanding his views. For Adorno, Auschwitz was not an exception but the culmination of humanity's history of calamity, and his reflections on this catastrophe directly bear on the question of war. The article posits that Adorno found in Odysseus's journey a paradigm for the self-preservation that drives human conflict, offering a philosophical lens through which to consider whether wars are avoidable. The piece underscores the relevance of Adorno's thought to contemporary debates on peace and conflict, drawing a line from ancient myth to modern catastrophe.