Between Oberrad and Amorbach 35pause when the few authentic descriptions of him at this time, like the
one by Erich Pfeiffer-Belli, emphasize his introversion and timidity.
Could this picture of him be a projection? Adorno did not lack self-
confidence and this is why he appeared to be precociously grown up.
Could it not be the case that his self-confidence induced an insecurity
and embarrassment in his fellow pupils that they were reluctant to
admit? It is perfectly true that he could not be described as boisterous.
He appeared frail and was exempted on health grounds from taking
part in the hated sports lessons. However, there is nothing to support
the view that he was timid or melancholic or that he suffered from
inhibitions or anxieties. Thus a photograph of 1917 shows a slim youth
standing in a relaxed pose with one hand on a chair rest and the other
round the neck of a large dog, the Great Dane of his childhood and
adolescent years.^36 His face, above all the nose and eyes, appears strik-
ingly sensitive. There is no hint of a smile, as if such a gesture would be
quite out of place. His gaze can be interpreted as reflecting an attitude
that is directed inwards, calmly expressing the question What experi-
ences and encounters will the world have to offer me? His pensive look
is mixed with a kind of dreaminess. He seems to be untouched by such
contemporary events as had already been revealed by the violent
excesses of the First World War. How could such a person know that
his would be the face of one of the many victims of the century?
Adorno experienced the four war years from the perspective of
a schoolboy who had grown up in a family that kept its distance from
the wave of patriotic war fever and rampant nationalist arrogance.
Nevertheless, like other boys of his age he read the Pocket Guide to the
World’s Navies and dreamed of becoming the captain of a warship. ‘We
bought the models of the different ships in the school stationery shop.’^37
His father had received his call-up papers. Years later, he would be
honoured for his war service.^38
During the winter of 1918–19, Frankfurt, like everywhere else, was
not spared the food shortages, plundering, mass excesses and uprisings
that followed the victory of the revolution that was celebrated in the
streets and the city squares. In November 1918, armed sailors and
dockworkers, the ‘storm petrels of the Revolution’, arrived at the cen-
tral station. Preparations had been made to use territorial reserves to
disarm the revolutionaries from Kiel. But the political tide favoured the
revolutionaries, who at once joined forces with the workers’ councils in
the factories. For a time they had their headquarters in the exclusive
Frankfurter Hof Hotel. From there, under the leadership of the sailors’
leader, Hermann Stichelmann, they authorized Georg Voigt, the left-
leaning liberal mayor, to continue in office.^39 Despite the mass demon-
strations of tens of thousands of people that the Council of Soldiers and
Workers had called for, despite the red flag waving from the central
station and the Römer, the influence of the revolutionaries in the town
was no more than a passing episode. After the elections to the city