The core of this volume is its presentation of Lowenthal's sixty-year-long intellectual career as a critical theorist and sociologist. The book includes some of his speeches on Theodor Adorno and Walter Benjamin and presents excerpts from conversations on his life as a scholar and teacher, as managing editor of the Institute for Social Research's famous journal, as government servant during and immediately after the war, and as observer and critic of contemporary culture and politics. Together these selections present an intriguing biographical panorama of a major intellectual figure.

Leo Lowenthal (1900-1993) was a sociologist known for his association with the Frankfurt School. After migrating to the United States, he held various positions, including research director for Voice of America, the Stanford Center for the Advanced Study of the Behavior Sciences, and finally settled in the Department of Sociology at the University of California, Berkeley, USA.