Siegfried Kracauer, born in 1889 in Frankfurt am Main and died in 1966 in New York, was many things in his life: an architect and writer, editor of the Frankfurter Zeitung, and a sought-after figure in the Weimar cultural scene, part of the philosophical quartet with Adorno, Benjamin, and Bloch, a Jew and political leftist. From 1933 to 1941, he was on the run, first to Paris, then traveling through Marseille and Lisbon to New York. There, he engaged in psychological warfare but also worked as a film writer, social scientist, and ultimately as what he had always been: a philosophical author. Jörg Später has traced the footsteps of this multifaceted life and written the first major biography of this extraordinary man. He illuminates the places and environments, shares the friendships, and brings the works to life.