Siegfried Kracauer

"Our Companion in Misfortune is an evocative and engaging portrait with much fresh insight into Kracauer's wide-ranging and imaginative work as theorist and critic of media and metropolitan experience. Gilloch successfully captures Kracauer's distinctive voice in its mix of melancholy and sharp wit. Much more than an introduction, this book gives its due to Kracauer as a major figure in the orbit of Frankfurt School Critical Theory."
Andreas Huyssen, Columbia University
"Kracauer may "rest a while in peace", but only for a while. Gilloch's magisterial study, forces a return to Kracauer. Music, film, the city and his own literary attempts tie Kracauer to the modern. The book reveals a thinker who, in responding to the demands of his own time, writes and thinks in a way that addresses the contemporary. There is an acuity of thought that allows Kracauer to engage our modernity. Gilloch's own power as a writer and a thinker is to stage that engagement. This is an invaluable book whose presence should be both welcomed and celebrated."
Andrew Benjamin, Monash University