Rainer Rochlitz was a philosopher, aesthetician and translator. He was in charge of research at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (National Centre for Scientific Research), Director of Seminars at the Practical School of the High Studies in Social Sciences and at the European University of Philosophy. He contributed much to make known the writings of the young Georg Lukács, Walter Benjamin and Jürgen Habermas of whom he was one of the translators in France. He also translated the works of Adorno, Ricoeur and Levi-Strauss. He dies prematurely after a struggle with cancer at the age of 56.