454 Part IV: Thinking the Unconditional
discussion between the two heads of the institute on the one hand and
the Sozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund (SDS) on the other.^21 Such
a discussion in fact took place in the Walter Kolb student residence in
the middle of June and focused initially on the question of the relev-
ance of critical theory for a political practice that envisaged changing
the social order. Shortly before the discussion took place, Horkheimer
had written an open letter, questioning the one-sided political commit-
ment of the left-wing movement. He asked whether ‘the claim made by
Asiatic potentates to base themselves on the doctrines of communism
had not degenerated into a macabre farce when these doctrines were
compared to the ideas of their founders.’^22 He warned against the
unquestioning acceptance of the socialist model on the grounds that
it blinded people to the totalitarian potential of communist systems.
In the subsequent discussion, Adorno kept his sense of proportion.
On the one hand, he interpreted the increasingly defamatory strategies
marshalled against the political demands and actions of the students as
the expression of a repressive society. On the other hand, he objected
vehemently to the idea of making immediate practical use of critical
theory. It was an illusion to speak of a revolutionary situation and, for
that reason, the students’ provocations ‘resembled the actions of caged
animals seeking a way out’.^23
On this occasion, Adorno was able to defend his position unhind-
ered. It was different a little later on in a talk he gave at the Free
University in Berlin. His reactions were correspondingly helpless. What
had happened? Having received an invitation to lecture from Peter
Szondi, he had planned, in this highly explosive situation, to give a talk
on Goethe’s Iphigenie in Tauris. He had provisionally entitled his
lecture ‘Against Barbarism’ and had worked on it during his summer
vacation in the Engadine in 1966 and into the new year, finally finishing
it in January 1967. He had then given the talk in Hamburg and also in
Brunswick.^24
On this occasion, a group of left-wing students marched up to the
lectern, unfurling a banner. It bore an inscription: ‘Berlin’s left-wing
fascists greet Teddy the Classicist’. The trouble-makers, whose banner
was seized by another group of students in the lecture hall and torn to
pieces,^25 publicly called on Adorno to act as witness in a trial that had
just begun against a prominent activist. In the SDS leaflet which they
circulated, it said: ‘Herr Professor Adorno – this indispensable theatre
prop of cultural events who purveys critical impotence at festivals, and
in Third Programmes, academies, etc., would like to assist us this evening
in creating a solemn occasion... .Herr Prof. Adorno is ready at all
times to certify that the Federal Republic has a latent tendency towards
inhumanity. Confronted with the inhumanity contained in the accusa-
tion against Fritz Teufel, however, he declines to make a statement. He
prefers to endure in silence the contradictions whose existence he has
previously drawn to our attention.’^26