Max Horkheimer was a German philosopher and sociologist who was famous for his work in critical theory as a member of the Frankfurt School of social research. Horkheimer addressed authoritarianism, militarism, economic disruption, environmental crisis, and the poverty of mass culture using the philosophy of history as a framework. This became the foundation of critical theory. His most important works include Eclipse of Reason (1947), Between Philosophy and Social Science (1930–1938) and, in collaboration with Theodor Adorno, Dialectic of Enlightenment (1947). Through the Frankfurt School, Horkheimer planned, supported and made other significant works possible.
Theodor W. Adorno was a German philosopher, musicologist, and social theorist.
Pope Pius VI was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 15 February 1775 to his death in August 1799.
The 120 Days of Sodom, or the School of Libertinage is an unfinished novel by the French writer and nobleman Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade, written in 1785 and published in 1904 after its manuscript was rediscovered. It describes the activities of four wealthy libertine Frenchmen who spend four months seeking the ultimate sexual gratification through orgies, sealing themselves in an inaccessible castle in the heart of the Black Forest with 12 accomplices, 20 designated victims and 10 servants. Four aging prostitutes relate stories of their most memorable clients whose sexual practices involved 600 "passions" including coprophilia, necrophilia, bestiality, incest, rape, and child sexual abuse. The stories inspire the libertines to engage in acts of increasing violence leading to the torture and murder of their victims, most of whom are adolescents and young women.
The Frankfurt School is a school of thought in sociology and critical philosophy. It is associated with the Institute for Social Research founded at Goethe University Frankfurt in 1923. Formed during the Weimar Republic during the European interwar period, the first generation of the Frankfurt School was composed of intellectuals, academics, and political dissidents dissatisfied with the socio-economic systems of the 1930s: namely, capitalism, fascism, and communism. Significant figures associated with the school include Max Horkheimer, Theodor Adorno, Walter Benjamin, Wilhelm Reich, Herbert Marcuse, and Jürgen Habermas.
A libertine is a person questioning and challenging most moral principles, such as responsibility or sexual restraints, and will often declare these traits as unnecessary or undesirable or evil. A libertine is especially someone who ignores or even spurns accepted morals and forms of behaviour observed by the larger society. The values and practices of libertines are known collectively as libertinism or libertinage and are described as an extreme form of hedonism or liberalism. Libertines put value on physical pleasures, meaning those experienced through the senses. As a philosophy, libertinism gained new-found adherents in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, particularly in France and Great Britain. Notable among these were John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester, and the Marquis de Sade.
Justine, or The Misfortunes of Virtue is a 1791 novel by Donatien Alphonse François de Sade, better known as the Marquis de Sade. Justine is set just before the French Revolution in France and tells the story of a young girl who goes under the name of Thérèse. Her story is recounted to Madame de Lorsagne while defending herself for her crimes, en route to punishment and death. She explains the series of misfortunes that led to her present situation.
Philosophy in the Boudoir is a 1795 book by the Marquis de Sade written in the form of a dramatic dialogue. Set in a boudoir the two lead characters make the argument that the only moral system that reinforces the recent political revolution is libertinism, and that if the people of France fail to adopt the libertine philosophy, France will be destined to return to a monarchic state.
Dialectic of Enlightenment is a work of philosophy and social criticism written by Frankfurt School philosophers Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno. The text, published in 1947, is a revised version of what the authors originally had circulated among friends and colleagues in 1944 under the title of Philosophical Fragments.
The libertine novel was an 18th-century literary genre of which the roots lay in the European but mainly French libertine tradition. The genre effectively ended with the French Revolution. Themes of libertine novels were anti-clericalism, anti-establishment and eroticism.
There have been many and varied references to the Marquis de Sade in popular culture, including fictional works, biographies and more minor references. The namesake of the psychological and subcultural term sadism, his name is used variously to evoke sexual violence, licentiousness and freedom of speech. In modern culture his works are simultaneously viewed as masterful analyses of how power and economics work, and as erotica. Sade's sexually explicit works were a medium for the articulation of the corrupt and hypocritical values of the elite in his society, which caused him to become imprisoned. He thus became a symbol of the artist's struggle with the censor. Sade's use of pornographic devices to create provocative works that subvert the prevailing moral values of his time inspired many other artists in a variety of media. The cruelties depicted in his works gave rise to the concept of sadism. Sade's works have to this day been kept alive by artists and intellectuals because they espouse a philosophy of extreme individualism that became reality in the economic liberalism of the following centuries.
Marquis de Sade: Justine is a 1969 erotic period drama film directed by Jesús Franco, written and produced by Harry Alan Towers, and based on the 1791 novel Justine by the Marquis de Sade. It stars Romina Power as the title character, with Maria Rohm, Klaus Kinski, Akim Tamiroff, Harald Leipnitz, Rosemary Dexter, Horst Frank, Sylva Koscina and Mercedes McCambridge.
Donatien Alphonse François de Sade, best known as the Marquis de Sade, was a French aristocrat, revolutionary and author of philosophical and sadomasochistic novels exploring such controversial subjects as rape, bestiality and necrophilia. His works evidence a philosophical mind advocating a materialist philosophy in which Nature dictates absolute freedom, unrestrained by morality, religion or law, with the pursuit of personal pleasure as its foremost principle. Besides novels, he wrote philosophical tracts, novellas, short stories, and a number of plays. Publication, dissemination, and translation of his works have long been hindered by censorship: not until 1983 were his works allowed unfettered distribution in the UK, for instance.
Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French writer, libertine, political activist and nobleman best known for his libertine novels and imprisonment for sex crimes, blasphemy and pornography. His works include novels, short stories, plays, dialogues, and political tracts. Some of these were published under his own name during his lifetime, but most appeared anonymously or posthumously.
Convent pornography, convent erotica, friar erotica, priest erotica, monk erotica, or clergy erotica includes paintings, sculpture, photographs, dramatic arts, music and writings that show scenes of erotic or sexual nature involving clergy.
Cruel Passion is a 1977 film starring Koo Stark, Martin Potter, Lydia Lisle, and Katherine Kath. It was directed by Chris Boger and based on the 1791 novel Justine by the Marquis de Sade.
Justine is the debut novel of Scottish author Alice Thompson. Published in 1996 by Canongate Books it was the joint winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize that year.
The River Ophelia is an Australian novel by Justine Ettler first published by Picador in 1995. The story moves between first-person narrative to an unnamed observer. It was highly controversial in Australia upon its publication, with some prominent critics dismissing it as pornographic, though Ettler herself has strongly denied this.
Gretel Adorno was a German chemist and intellectual figure within the Frankfurt School of critical theory.
When We Lost Our Heads is a 2022 Canadian novel by author Heather O'Neill and published by HarperCollins.
