Dossier Benjamin

by Fredric Jameson, Flavia Gasperetti (Translator), Massimo Palma (Contributor)

Walter Benjamin è stato un pensatore anti-filosofico e anti-sistematico. E Fredric Jameson, il più grande critico americano vivente, ne conosce alla perfezione non solo gli scritti, ma anche le ambiguità. Tanto da offrirci una sorprendente lente di lettura di tutte le sue principali opere e di un gran numero di recensioni di libri, note, lettere, che ne rivelano, oltre allo spessore concettuale, l’inclinazione ineludibile nei confronti della scrittura. Dagli articoli più brevi ai progetti più ambiziosi, dai saggi arcinoti come Baudelaire o L’opera d’arte nell’epoca della sua riproducibilità tecnica ai frammenti postumi, in questo repertorio di documenti e rivelazioni, di enigmi e contraddizioni, non cessa di stupire la coesistenza di campi linguistici e codici tematici apparentemente inconciliabili, la tensione mai domata tra il lato mistico o teologico e la vocazione politica e storica, che rende Benjamin ancora oggi riferimento imprescindibile di ogni indagine sul capitalismo odierno. Le analisi di Jameson dei concetti di gioco e di spazio, di esperienza e città, di massa e citazione si snodano attraverso un “corpo a corpo” da cui non esce certo un Benjamin facile, ma finalmente scrivibile.

Genres: Philosophy, Theory, Nonfiction

382 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2016

About the author

Fredric Jameson was an American literary critic, philosopher and Marxist political theorist. He was best known for his analysis of contemporary cultural trends, particularly his analysis of postmodernity and capitalism. Jameson's best-known books include Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (1991) and The Political Unconscious (1981).

Reviews

[Owen Hatherley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pleasantly surprised, after leaving this on my shelf for a while, to find this is a real written-through book, rather than an essay collection (Verso like to not draw attention to an essay collection being one, but that means that in the case of someone who compiled a lot of them, as Jameson did, you don't necessarily realise when you have an actual, new, entire book instead as everything has a similar blurb). So here you have Jameson in late life faced with contemporary horrors different to, but not wildly dissimilar to those Benjamin faced more directly and physically in the last decade of his life, with the freedom to ramble and puff the pipe of a writer too old to care whether anyone was bothered about how weird his work was getting. Very strictly for the heads - I can't imagine what anyone who hadn't read a *lot* of Benjamin would get out of it, likely not much - but a very thoughtful appraisal of WB as modernist, as political philosopher, and as non-melancholic.

[Rhys · Rating 4 out of 5]

An insightful exploration of the constellations of Benjamin's thought.

"Mass politics, however—for which the whole issue of representative democracy has by now become a rhetorical convention, less a cause than a form of corruption in its own right—now once again seems on the point of reinventing a fascism whose name it had forgotten. Perhaps, if we want to learn to read Benjamin correctly and to draw new energies from his prophecies—“weakly messianic” as they may have been—we should once again begin to distinguish the forces of communism and fascism at work beneath the surface of world politics and self-consciously rearticulate a struggle in which he had his word to say. Mass politics lies at the very center of Benjamin’s thought: in Max Horkheimer’s memorable formula, 'He has nothing useful to say about fascism who is unwilling to mention capitalism.'"

[Robert T Bowie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good Overview

Walter Benjamin wrote a great deal more than typical readers can get through. Benjamin comes across in his own prose as largely a straight forward observer. Jameson both points out key texts to read and where philosophical analysis reveals Benjamin to be more complex or paradoxical than appears at first glance. Use this book to read or go back and reread the original works of Benjamin referenced. Cheap ebook complete collections are available in German. Illumination and Reflections are good ebook companions in English.

[Marginalia Σημειώσεις στο περιθώριο]

Κριτική του βιβλίου από τον Πάνο Σταθάτο στα Marginalia: https://marginalia.gr/arthro/enas-ast...

[Randy Wilson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Last year I read Benjamin’s ‘One-Way Street’ and understood only a fraction of it. I had read Jameson’s ‘Postmodernism’ which while stimulating was a difficult slog and when I saw ‘The Benjamin Files’ I grabbed it. I’m not sure what made me turn to a difficult writer to explain and edify me about another difficult writer. The outcome was predictable. I barely understood either Jameson or what he was saying about Benjamin.

And yet….somehow I made it through the book and enjoyed the act of reading even if I can’t adequately explain what Jameson’s interpretation of Benjamin is. Now I want to reread ‘One-Way Street’ and perhaps other Benjamin essays that Jameson discusses. It’s like slowly translating a text from a language I barely comprehend. If I keep at it, over time, in time, I will gain deep and meaningful insights. Or not!

[Jared · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jameson reinvigorates the Flaneur in such interesting ways

[michal k-c · Rating 3 out of 5]

pretty decent summary reading of Benjamin’s work and thought, with much appreciated attention to Benjamin’s style and peculiar theology. reeeeaaaallllly made me wish Jameson would write something long about Deleuze. i do not ask for much

[Jon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This work turned out to be one of my favorites I've read from Jameson in some time. It was a pleasure to read, particularly after having recently finished One-Way Street: And Other Writings (called "Benjamin's only book"), which, along with that work's other essays (in its currently published configuration), Jameson extensively discusses here.

Jameson starts by describing Benjamin's work in what I think your could call a somewhat characteristically lyrical way:

This skiff is moving, but not only under the momentum of the wind of history; he has no control of the current—it is by way of setting the sail and catching that wind that we can control our own destiny. It is an image that can only multiply our questions, not settle them; and in any case, the shift takes place within the first sentence itself, which problematizes the very notion of history and shifts our attention from the question of whether history has a direction to that of how to register that direction (assuming it exists).

He then proceeds to interrogate Benjamin's work with his equally characteristically free-range-roaming discourse, for instance shuttling between André Malraux:

For Malraux, the instant of the bet marks a suspension of reality in time, in which both wealth and poverty are momentarily abolished: gambling, in other words, offers the satisfaction (if not the excitement) of a unique temporal moment in which neither riches nor poverty exist, and a present of time which risks destroying temporality altogether.

And this guy named Morgan:

Marxism has its own tradition of such mixed feelings, which are to be found in Frederick Lewis Morgan, the grandfather of anthropology (according to Lévi-Strauss) as well as the father of Marxist anthropology as such.

(I think there was a problem with the book's editing here; surely he meant Lewis Henry Morgan).

At any rate, if you are a fan of Benjamin's essay, this book will likely be of interest. Jameson does here what he does best: dissect Benjamin's unique vocabulary—terms such as aura and dialectical image---much of which you might take for granted while reading One-Way Street or one of his other collections, and traces their meaning throughout Benjamin's work. Personally I have by no means read all of Benjamin's work, but when I come back to him again my experience will definitely be enriched.

[Goatboy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Benjamin was notoriously gnomic in his writings and so any second source review is always welcome to me. Jameson obviously has the Marxist background to cover that aspect of Benjamin's project, and he does quite well with the other aspects as well. A few places where I felt I wasn't quite understanding Jameson's (or Benjamin's) points, but overall a very clear and easy to understand treatment. Much like Lacan and Lacanian secondary writings, I gain something new with each read or re-read within this terrain, much like a grand park you can't see at all at once from any angle but only learn by physically traversing every nook and cranny, eventually building up a better and better understanding of the land by experiencing it from many angles of engagement.

[Jay Rothermel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Benjamin had many interesting interests, and wrote about them artfully. He was no party ideologue. Neither is Jameson, though Jameson had intellectually internalized the euphemisms and bad faith of petty bourgeois academic "Marxism." Still, a clear and provocative explainer.

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Comprehensive deep-dive into Benjamin’s thought by one of the all-time great deep-divers (RIP king). Final chapter (“History and the Messianic”) is, in an appropriate instance of Benjaminian redemption, the real highlight.

[David Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Depends on knowing Benjamin a lot better than I do Got about 60% but worth it for the periodic Jamesonian nuggets.

[Kit · Rating 2 out of 5]

honestly? disappointingly generic. maybe if you haven't read Benjamin you'll get more out of it. But in that case, just read him instead! Sorry Jameson--I love some of your other books.