Seyda
Kurt

Constructed in fragments, alternating between the essayistic-theoretical register and deeply personal pages, a step away from pure poetry, Hate is a revolutionary reflection on a sentiment that, since the days of Christianity, has always been read in a negative light because it was considered unnecessarily destructive, and a harbinger of social confrontation. In Kurt’s reading, on the other hand, hatred can and should be an instrument of cohesion that manages to take on a positive dimension: unlike contempt, behind which lies a sense of superiority and a rejection of the other as an interlocutor, hatred, in its constructive declension, can even represent the premise for a dialogue, or at least a dialectic.

Proceeding by examples taken from philosophical thought, film, television series, and literature, Kurt conducts an illuminating examination of the various nuances the word hate has taken on throughout history, and in doing so reflects on major contemporary nodes: police violence (in the United States as in Germany), racism, the concentrationary universe, and revolts against totalitarian regimes. And it tells the stories of those who have been able to channel their hatred without giving up on it, without getting enclosed in the niche of forgiveness, but turning anger into “structural” action, and into revolution.