Conversations With Lukacs

Using the technique of prepared questions, Conversations with Lukacs is a brilliantgathering of thoughts and insights covering topics as ontology, the techniques of manipulativesocieties, the pitfalls of combating Stalinism with Stalinist methods, and the problems ofintellectuals in advanced capitalist societies. Above all, there is the restatement of Lukacsunshaken conviction that the working class, with all the changes that have occurred in its way oflife and composition, is still the historical carrier of social transformation.Lukcas'sinterlocutors in these four conversations are Hans Heinz Holz, Leo Kofler, and Wolfgang Abendroth.Each of them engages LukA!cs in separate dialogues, on being and consciousness (Holz), onsociety and the individual (Kofler), and on the elements of scientific politics (Abendroth). Lukacs,Abendroth, and Holz work toward a "Provisional Summary" in the last conversation.The interlocutorsand the editor write that "These conversations show very clearly the basis of abstraction in theexperiences of everyday life.... This gives these conversations with Lukacs a more than anecdotalvalue; for the unmediated way in which thought is produced in conversation corresponds exactly tothat primary level of experience, the data of everyday reality, whose theoretical value Lukacsemphasizes.... They aspire to bear witness to the living thought of one of the great men of ourcentury, and to provide the opportunity to approach this thought by the simplest possibleroute."