Miles goes back to Marcuse's work on aesthetics to link philosophy, art, history, political analysis, and sociological insights in a deeply humane search for the way to a better world. It deserves a very wide readership. -- Peter Marcuse (with obvious bias). This book presents a comprehensive critical overview and a comprehensive interrogation of Marcuse's writings on art and aesthetics. Miles reads Marcuse as envisaging art as a way in which societies re-imagine themselves and project visions of a freer, happier, and better way of life. In these troubled times, it is refreshing to re-engage with Marcuse's utopian visions of art and society and Miles proves a highly capable guide to this adventure. -- Douglas Kellner, UCLA, author of Herbert Marcuse and the Crisis of Marxism and Media Spectacle and the Crisis of Democracy Introducing the aesthetic writings of radical philosopher Herbert Marcuse, cultural theorist Malcolm Miles explores the role the imagination plays for Marcuse in political transformation, offering us the hope of a horizon to neo-liberal capitalism's treachery. How we need this book today: intelligently argued - clever, funny, sometimes wistful - it is a call to arms (to art), beautifully written from the heart. -- Jane Rendell, Professor and Vice Dean of Research, The Bartlett, UCL, and author of Site-Writing (2010), Art and Architecture (2006) and The Pursuit of Pleasure (2002).
