Herbert Marcuse, Philosopher of Utopia: A Graphic Biography

by Andrew Lamas (Editor), Andrew Lamas (Editor), Paul Buhle (Editor), Angela Y. Davis (Foreword), Nick Thorkelson (Illustrator)

New
Paperback
2019
$14.29

Nick Thorkelson's exploration of the ideas and personality of Herbert Marcuse is exactly the sort of comic book I have longed to read. It is engaging, artful, and explores the world of revolutionary ideas. Books like this keep the fire going inside. --Joe Sacco

I believe that Marcuse's ideas can be as valuable today as they were fifty years ago. --Angela Y. Davis, from the foreword

A warm, funny, richly detailed biography. Thorkelson has found a powerful graphic style and narrative voice that animate Marcuse's life and his theory of rebellion. As both personal saga and primer on radical political philosophy, it could not be more relevant to today's resistance movement. --Dan Wasserman, The Boston Globe political cartoonist

Herbert Marcuse (1898-1979) was a little-known German scholar when he became one of the 20^th century's most unlikely pop stars: a celebrity philosopher. In the 1960s, his argument for a principled utopianism catalyzed the ideals of a rebellious generation, and Marcuse became an intellectual guide for activists and revolutionaries around the world. The legacy of his contribution to a radical shift of consciousness has resonated in social-change movements ever since.

This comics-format biography brings Marcuse's life, work, and times to a new generation. From his youth in Weimar Germany and early studies with Martin Heidegger, to his emigration from Nazi Germany along with colleagues of the Frankfurt School, to his rise as one of its major theorists along with Theodor Adorno and Walter Benjamin, to his status as a countercultural icon, readers are introduced to the theories and circumstances that made Marcuse into one of the world's most influential intellectuals.

Mentor to a young Angela Davis and often referred to as the unofficial faculty advisor to the New Left, Marcuse's controversial critique of the comfortable unfreedoms of post-WWII capitalism entered popular consciousness with the 1964 publication of One-Dimensional Man, which sold over 100,000 copies in its first years in print. His argument for the possibility of a more humane and sustainable world was grounded in a personal knowledge of the violence of authoritarianism, and the risk of its resurgence. Perennially relevant, radical, and inspiring, Marcuse's concept of the Great Refusal -- the protest against that which is --is a guide for our times.

More praise for Herbert Marcuse, Philosopher of Utopia

In the age of Trump, an updated version of fascism is back, memory has become a burden, and the notion of a comprehensive politics in the age of single issues appears obsolete, if not quaint. All the more reason to read Herbert Marcuse, Philosopher of Utopia. Marcuse not only connected the dots among various problems, theories, and intellectual fields, he infused them with a sense of passion, rigorousness and hope. Marcuse was a philosopher who pushed ideas into the social realm, was fearless in his critique of capitalism, and joyous in his belief that collective struggles in the service of a radical democracy were a necessity rather than an option. His ideas are arguably more relevant than they were fifty years ago because the threats to humankind are more dangerous today. Marcuse's energizing sense of critique, hope, politics, and Utopian vision are more necessary than ever, especially for the emerging generations of young activists. --Henry A. Giroux, author of American Nightmare: Facing the Challenge of Fascism

Synopsis

Nick Thorkelson's exploration of the ideas and personality of Herbert Marcuse is exactly the sort of comic book I have longed to read. It is engaging, artful, and explores the world of revolutionary ideas. Books like this keep the fire going inside. --Joe Sacco

I believe that Marcuse's ideas can be as valuable today as they were fifty years ago. --Angela Y. Davis, from the foreword

A warm, funny, richly detailed biography. Thorkelson has found a powerful graphic style and narrative voice that animate Marcuse's life and his theory of rebellion. As both personal saga and primer on radical political philosophy, it could not be more relevant to today's resistance movement. --Dan Wasserman, The Boston Globe political cartoonist

Herbert Marcuse (1898-1979) was a little-known German scholar when he became one of the 20^th century's most unlikely pop stars: a celebrity philosopher. In the 1960s, his argument for a principled utopianism catalyzed the ideals of a rebellious generation, and Marcuse became an intellectual guide for activists and revolutionaries around the world. The legacy of his contribution to a radical shift of consciousness has resonated in social-change movements ever since.

This comics-format biography brings Marcuse's life, work, and times to a new generation. From his youth in Weimar Germany and early studies with Martin Heidegger, to his emigration from Nazi Germany along with colleagues of the Frankfurt School, to his rise as one of its major theorists along with Theodor Adorno and Walter Benjamin, to his status as a countercultural icon, readers are introduced to the theories and circumstances that made Marcuse into one of the world's most influential intellectuals.

Mentor to a young Angela Davis and often referred to as the unofficial faculty advisor to the New Left, Marcuse's controversial critique of the comfortable unfreedoms of post-WWII capitalism entered popular consciousness with the 1964 publication of One-Dimensional Man, which sold over 100,000 copies in its first years in print. His argument for the possibility of a more humane and sustainable world was grounded in a personal knowledge of the violence of authoritarianism, and the risk of its resurgence. Perennially relevant, radical, and inspiring, Marcuse's concept of the Great Refusal -- the protest against that which is --is a guide for our times.

More praise for Herbert Marcuse, Philosopher of Utopia

In the age of Trump, an updated version of fascism is back, memory has become a burden, and the notion of a comprehensive politics in the age of single issues appears obsolete, if not quaint. All the more reason to read Herbert Marcuse, Philosopher of Utopia. Marcuse not only connected the dots among various problems, theories, and intellectual fields, he infused them with a sense of passion, rigorousness and hope. Marcuse was a philosopher who pushed ideas into the social realm, was fearless in his critique of capitalism, and joyous in his belief that collective struggles in the service of a radical democracy were a necessity rather than an option. His ideas are arguably more relevant than they were fifty years ago because the threats to humankind are more dangerous today. Marcuse's energizing sense of critique, hope, politics, and Utopian vision are more necessary than ever, especially for the emerging generations of young activists. --Henry A. Giroux, author of American Nightmare: Facing the Challenge of Fascism

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 128
Edition: 1
Publisher: City Lights Publishers
Published: 02 Apr 2019
ISBN 10: 0872867854
ISBN 13: 9780872867857

Author Bio

Nick Thorkelson is a cartoonist living in Boston. He has done cartoons on local politics for The Boston Globe and in support of organizations working on economic justice, peace, and public health. He is the co-author and/or illustrator of The Earth Belongs to the People, The Underhanded History of the USA, The Legal Rights of Union Stewards, The Comic Strip of Neoliberalism, and Economic Meltdown Funnies, and has contributed to a number of nonfiction comics anthologies. He is working on a graphic novel about the end of the Sixties, A Better World Is Possible. Nick also moonlights as a musician, animator, graphic designer, and painter.

Paul Buhle, a journal publisher in the New Left and publisher of one of the first Underground Comix, has written or edited many volumes including the biographies of C.L.R. James, William Appleman Willliams and Harvey Kurtzman, returned to comic art with a dozen volumes since 2005 including The Beats, among other subjects. His works, including comics, have been published in more than a dozen languages. He taught at Brown University until retirement.

Andrew T. Lamas teaches urban studies and critical theory at the University of Pennsylvania, is co-editor of The Great Refusal: Herbert Marcuse and Contemporary Social Movements (Temple University Press, 2017), and serves on the boards of the International Herbert Marcuse Society, the Radical Philosophy Review, and the Bread and Roses Community Fund.

Angela Y. Davis is the Distinguished Professor Emerita in the History of Consciousness and Feminist Studies Departments at the University of California--Santa Cruz. A former student of Herbert Marcuse, she is the author of many books and articles, including Angela Davis: An Autobiography (1974), Women, Race and Class (1981), Blues Legacies and Black Feminism: Gertrude Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith, and Billie Holiday (1998), Are Prisons Obsolete? (2003), Abolition Democracy: Beyond Empire, Prisons and Torture (2005), The Meaning of Freedom and other Difficult Dialogues (2012), and Freedom is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement (2016). She is a founding member of Critical Resistance, which is dedicated to the dismantling of the prison industrial complex. She is the subject of the acclaimed documentary Free Angela and All Political Prisoners (2012).