fredric jameson walter benjamin or nostalgia
TRANSCRIPT
7/25/2019 Fredric Jameson Walter Benjamin or Nostalgia
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Walter
Benjamin,
or
Nostalgia
BY
FREDRIC
JAMESON
So the
melancholy
hat
speaks
from he
pages
of
Benjamin's
essays
-
private
depressions,
rofessional iscouragement,
he
dejection
of
the
outsider,
he
distress
n
the
face
of
a
political
nd
historical
ight-
mare
-
searches
the
past
for an
adequate object,
for
ome
emblem
or
Image
at
which,
as in
religious
meditation,
he
mind can
stare
itself
ut,
into
which
it can
discharge
ts
morbid
humors
nd
know
momentary,
f
only
an
esthetic,
elief.
t
finds t:
In
the
Germany
f
the thirtyyearswar, in the Paris of the late nineteenth entury
("Paris
-
the
capitol
of
the
nineteenth
entury").
For
they
re
both
-
the
baroque
and the
modern
in
their
very
essence
allegorical,
and
they
match he
thought rocess
f
the theorist
f
allegory,
which,
disembodied ntention
earching
or
ome external
bject
n
which
to
take
hape,
s
itself
lready llegorical
vant la lettre.
Indeed,
It
seems
to me
that
Walter
Benjamin's
thought
s best
grasped
s
an
allegorical
ne,
as a set
of
parallel,
discontinuous
evels
of meditation
hich s
notwithout
esemblance
o
that
ultimate
model
of allegoricalcomposition escribedby Dante in his letterto
Can
Grande delia
Scala,
where he
speaks
of
the
four
dimensions
f
his
♦
Walter
Benjamin
was
born in
1892 of
a
wealthy
Jewish
family
in Berlin.
Unfit
for
ervice
n World
War
I,
he
studied
for a
time in
Bern,
and
returning
o
Berlin
n
1920 tried
unsuccessfully
o found
a
literary
eview
there,
before
turning
to academic
life
as a
career.
His
Orifins of
German
Tragedy
was however
refused
as
a
Ph.D. thesis
t
the
University
f
Frankfurt
n 1925.
Meanwhile,
he
had
begun
to
translate
Proust,
and,
under
the
influence
of Lukncs*
History
and
Class Con-
sciousness,
ecame
a
Marxist,
isiting
Moscow
in 1926-27. After
933,
he
emigrated
to Paris
and
pursued
work on his unfinished
project
Paris:
Capitol
of
the
Nine-
teenth
Century.
He
committed
uicide at
the
Spanish
border fter
n unsuccessful
attempt
o
flee
occupied
France
in 1940. He
numbered
among
close
friends
nd
intellectual
cquaintances,
at various
moments
of
his
life,
Ernst
Bloch,
Gershom
Scholem,T. W. Adorno,and Bert Brecht.
Every
feeling
s
attached
to
an a
priori
object,
and
the
presentation
f
the latter
s the
phenomenology
f the
former.
-
Ursprung
des
deutschen
Trauerspiels
7/25/2019 Fredric Jameson Walter Benjamin or Nostalgia
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Walter
Benjamin,
r
Nostalgia
53
poem:
the
literal
(his
hero's
earthly
destinies),
the
allegorical
the
fate
of
his
soul),
the
moral
(in
which the encounters
f the
main
character
esume
ne
aspect
or another
f
the ife
of
Christ),
and
the
anagogical
(where
the
individual drama
of
Dante
foreshadows
he
progress
f the human
race towards
the
Last
Judgement)*.
t
will
not
be hard
to
adapt
this scheme
to
twentieth
entury eality,
f
for
literal
we read
simply
sychological,
nd
for
llegorical
thical;
f for
the
dominant
rchetypal attern
f
the life
of
Christ
we
substitute
some
more modernone
(and
for
myself,
eplacingreligion
with
the
religion f art,thiswill be thecoming ntobeingof theworkof art
itself,
he
incarnation f
meaning
n
Language);
if
finally
we
replace
theology
with
politics,
nd
make of
Dante's
eschatology
n
earthly
one,
where
the human race finds ts
salvation,
not in
eternity,
ut
in
History
tself.
Benjamin's
work
eems to
me
to
be
marked
by
a
painful
training
towards
wholeness
r
unity
of
experience
which
the
historical
it-
uation
threatens
o
shatter
t
every
urn.
Λ visionof
a
world
of
ruins
and
fragments,
n ancientchaos of
whatever
nature
on
the
point
of
overwhelmingonsciousness these arc
some of
the
images
that
seem
to
recur,
ither
n
Benjamin
himself
r
in
your
own mind as
you
read
him. The
idea
of
wholeness
or of
unity
s
of course
not
original
with him: how
many
modern
philosophers
ave
described
the
"damaged
existence"
we lead
in
modern
ociety,
he
psychological
impairment
f the
division f
labor and of
specialization,
he
general
alienation
nd dchumanization
f
modern
ife
and
the
specific
orms
such
alienation
takes?Yet for
the most
part
these
analyses
remain
abstract;
nd
through
hem
peaks
the
resignation
f
the
intellectual
specialist
o
his
owti
maimed
prosrnt;
he dream
of
wholeness,
where
itpersists,ttaches tself o someone lse'sfuture.Benjamin s unique
among
these thinkers
n
that he
wants
to
save
his own
life as
well:
hence the
peculiar
fascination f
his
writings,ncomparable
ot
only
for
heir
ialectical
ntelligence,
or even
for
he
poetic
ensibility
hey
express,
ut
above
all,
perhaps,
for
the
manner
n
which
the
auto-
biographical art
of his mind
finds
ymbolic
atisfaction
n the
shape
of
deas
abstractly,
n
objective
guises,
xpressed.
Psychologically,
he
drive
towards
unity
takes
the
form of
an
obsession
with
he
past
and
with
memory.
enuine
memory
etermines
*
It is, at least,a morefamiliar nd less intimidatingmodel than thatproposed
by
Benjamin
himself,
n a
letter
o
Max
Rychncr:
I have
never been
able to
in-
quire
and
think
otherwise
han,
if
may
so
put
it,
n
a
theological
ense
-
name )
in
conformity
with the Talmudic
prescription
egarding
the
forty-nine
evels
of
meaning
n
every
passage
of
the
Torah."
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54
FREDRIC
JAMESON
"whether he
Individual
an
have
a
picture
f
himself,
whether
he
can
master
his
own
experience."
"Every
passion
borders
n
chaos,
but
the
passion
f thecollector
orders
n
the
chaos of
memory"
and
it
was
in
the
image
of
the
collector
hat
Benjamin
foundone
of
his
most
comfortable
dentities).
Memory
forges
he chain
of
tradition
that
passes
events on from
generation
o
generation."
trange
re-
flexions,
hese
strange ubjects
f reflexion
or
Marxist
one
thinks
of
Sartre's
acid
comment n
his
orthodox
Marxist
contemporaries:
"materialisms
the
ubjectivity
f those
who
are
ashamed
of
their wn
subjectivity").YetBenjaminkeptfaithwithProust,whomhe trans-
lated,
ong
after
is own
discovery
f
communism;
ike
Proust
lso,
he
saw in his
favorite
oet
Baudelaire
an
analogous
obsession
with
rem-
iniscence
nd
involuntary emory;
nd he followed
is
iterary
master
in
the
fragmentary
vocation
of his
own
childhood
called
Berliner
Kindheit
um
1900;
he also
began
the
task of
recovering
is own
existence
with
short
ssayistic
ketches,
ecords
f
dreams,
f
isolated
impressions
nd
experiences,
hich
however
he
was
unable
to
carry
to the
greater
writer's
ltimate
narrative
nity.
He was perhaps
more onscious
f
what
prevents
s
from
ssimilat-
ing
our life
experience
han of the
formuch a
perfected
ifewould
take:
fascinated,
or
example,
with Freud's distinction
etween
un-
conscious
memory
nd
the
conscious
ct of
recollection,
hich
was
for
Freud
basically
way
of
destroying
r
eradicating
what
the
former
was
designed
to
preserve:
consciousness
ppears
in
the
system
of
perception
n
place
of
the
memory
races
.
.
consciousness
nd
the
leaving
behind f
a
memory
race
re
within he
ame
system
mutually
incompatible."
or
Freud,
he
function
f
consciousness
s the
defense
of
the
organism
gainst
hocks
from
he
external
nvironment:
n this
sensetraumas, ysterical epetitions,reams, re ways in whichthe
incompletely
ssimilated
hock
attempts
o
make
its
way
through
o
consciousness
nd
hence
to
ultimate
appeasement
In
Benjamin's
hands,
this idea
becomes
an
instrument
f
historical
description,
way
of
showing
how
in modern
ociety,
erhaps
on
account
of
the
increasing uantity
f shocks
of
all kinds
to
which
the
organism
s
henceforth
ubjected,
hese
defense
mechanisms
re
no
longerpersonal
ones:
a whole
series
of
mechanical
substitutes
ntervenes
etween
consciousness
nd
its
objects
shielding
us
perhaps,
yet
at
the
same
time
depriving
s of
any
way
of
assimilating
what
happens
to
us
or
to
any
genuinely ersonal xperience. hus, togiveonlyone example,
the
newspaper
tands
as a shock-absorber
f
novelty,
umbing
us
to
what
mightperhaps
otherwise
verwhelm
s,
but
at the
same
time
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Walter
Benjamin,
r
Nostalgia
55
rendering
ts eventsneutral
nd
impersonal,
making
f them
what
by
definition as
no
common
denominator
with
our
private
existences.
Experience
s
moreover
ocially
conditioned
n that it
depends
on
a
certain
rhythm
f
recurrences
nd
similarities,
n
certain
ategories
of
ikeness
n
events
which are
properly
ultural
n
origin.
Thus
even
in
Proust
nd
Baudelaire,
who
lived
n
relatively
ragmented
ocieties,
ritualistic
evices,
ften
nconscious,
re
primary
lements
n the
con-
struction f form:
we
recognize
hem n
the
"vie
antérieure" nd
the
correspondences
f
Baudelaire,
in
the ceremonies
f
salon
life
in
Proust. And where the modernwriter riesto create a perpetual
present
as in Kafka the
mystery
nherent
n the
events
eems
to
resultnot
so
much from heir
novelty
s from he
feeling
hat
they
have
merely
been
forgotten,
hat
they
are
in
some
sense
"familiar,"
in
the
haunting
ignificance
hich
Baudelaire
ent
that word.
Yet
as
society
ncreasingly
ecays,
uch
rhythms
f
experience
re
less
and
less
available.
At
this
point,
however,
sychological
escription
eems to
pass
over
insensibly
nto moral
udgement,
nto
a vision
of the
reconciliation
of
past
and
present
which is somehow
an ethical
one.
But
for
the
westernreaderthe whole ethical dimension f Benjamin'swork is
likely
to
be
perplexing,
ncorporating
s
it docs
a kind
of ethical
psychology
which,
codified
by
Goethe,
has
become
traditional
n
Germany
nd
deeply
rooted
n
the German
anguage,
but
for
which
we
have
no
equivalent.
This
Lehensweisheit
s
indeed
a
kind
of
half-
way
house
between
the
classical
idea
of
a
fixed
human
nature,
with
its
psychology
f
the
humors,
assions,
ins
or
character
ypes;
and
the
modern
dea of
pure
historicity,
f the
determining
nfluence
f
the situation r
environment.
s
a
compromise
n
the
domain
of
the
individualpersonality,t is not unlike the compromise f Hegel in
the realm
of
history
tself:
nd
where
for
he
atter
general
meaning
was
immanent
o
the
particular
moment
f
history,
or Goethe
in
some sense
the overall
goal
of the
personality
nd of
its
development
is
built nto the
particular
motion
n
question,
r
latent
n the
par-
ticular
tage
n the ndividual's
growth.
For
the
system
s
based
on
a
vision
of
the
full
development
f
the
personality
a
writer
ike
Gide,
deeply
nfluenced'
y
Goethe,
gives
but
a
pale
and
narcissistic
eflexion
of
this
thic,
which
xpressed
middle
lass
ndividualism
t the
moment
of
its
historic
riumph);
t
neither
ims
to
bend
the
personality
o
somepurely xternal tandard fdiscipline,s is thecase withChris-
tianity,
or
to
abandon
it to the
meaningless
ccidents
of
empirical
psychology,
s
is
the case
with most
modern
thics,
but
rather
ees
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56
FREDRIC
JAMESON
the
individual
psychological xperience
s
something
which includes
within
tself
eeds
of
development,
omething
n which
ethical
growth
is inherent
s a
kind of
interiorized
rovidence.
So,
for
xample,
he
closing
ines
of
Wilhelm Meister:
You
make
me
think
of
Saul,
the
son
of
Kish,
who
went
forth
o
seek
his
father's
sses
and
found,
instead,
kingdom "
It
is
however
haracteristic
f
Benjamin
that n
his
most
complete
expression
f
this
Goethean
thic,
he
ong
essay
on
Elective
Affinities,
he
should
ay
more
tress n
the
dangers
hat menace
the
personality
thanon thepicture f ts ultimate evelopment. or thisessay,which
speaks
the
anguage
of
Goethean
ife-
sychology,
s
at the
same
time
a
critique
f the
reactionary
orces
n
German
society
which
made
this
psychology
heir wn:
working
with the
concept
f
myth,
t
is at
the same
time an
attackon
the obscurantist
deologies
which
made
the
notion
f
myth
heir
allying
ry.
In
this,
he
polemic
posture
f
Benjamin
can be
instructive
or
all
those
of
us
who,
undialectically,
are
tempted imply
to
reject
the
concept
of
myth
altogether,
n
account f
the
deological
ses to
which t is
ordinarily ut;
for
whom
this
concept,
ike
related
nes
of
magic
or
charisma,
eems
not
to aim
at a rational
nalysis
fthe rrational utrather t a consecrationf
it
through anguage.
But for
Benjamin
Elective
Affinities
ay
be
considered
mythical
work,
n
condition
we
understand
myth
ns
that element
from
which
the
work eeks
o
free
tself:
as some
earlier
haos
of
nstinctual
orces,
inchoate,
natural,
pre-individualistic,
s that
which
is
destructive
f
genuine
ndividuality,
hat
which consciousness
must
overcome
f
it
is
to
attain
any
real
autonomy
f
its
own,
if
it
is to
accede
to
any
properly
uman
level
of
existence.
Is it
far-fetched
o
see
in
this
oppositionbetweenmythical orces nd the individualspirita dis-
guised
expression
f
Benjamin's
thoughts
bout
past
and
present,
n
image
of
the
way
in
which a
remembering
onsciousness
masters
ts
past
and
brings
o
ight
whatwould
otherwise
e
lost
n the
prehistory
of
the
organism?
Nor
should
we
forget
hat
the
essay
on
Elective
Affinities
s itself
way
of
recovering
he
past,
this
time
a
cultural
past,
one
given
over
to
the
dark
mythical
orces f
a
proto-fascist
tradition.
Benjamin's
dialectical
skill
can
be
seen
in the
way
this
idea
of
myth
s
expressed
hrough
ttention
o the
form
f
Goethe's
novel,
no doubt one of themost ccentric fWestern iterature,n itscom-
bination
of
an
eighteenth
entury
eremoniousness
ith
symbols
of
a
strangely
rtificial,
llegorical
uality:
objects
which
appear
in the
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Walter
Benjamin,
r
Nostalgia
57
blankncss f
the non visual
narrative
tyle
s
though
solated
gainst
a
void,
as
though
fateful
with
a
kind of
geometrical
meaning
-
cautiously
electeddetail
of
landscape,
too
symmetrical
ot to
have
significance,
nalogies,
uch
as
the
chemical
one
that
gives
the novel
its
title,
too
amply developed
not to
be
emblematic.The
reader
is
of
course familiar
with
symbolism
verywhere
n
the modern
novel;
but
in
general
the
symbolism
s
built
nto
the
work,
ike
a
sheet of
instructions
upplied
inside the box
along
with
the
puzzle pieces.
Here we feel the
burden
f
guilt
aid
upon
us
as
readers,
hat
we
lack
what strikesus almostas a culturally nheritedmode of thinking,
accessible
nly
to
thosewho are that
ulture's
members: nd
no
doubt
the
Goethean
system
does
project
tself n some such
way,
in
its
claim
to
universality.
The
originality
f
Benjamin
s
to
cut
across
the sterile
pposition
between
he
arbitrary
nterpretations
f
the
symbol
n the one
hand,
and
the
blank
failure
to see what it
means
on
the other:
Elective
Affinities
s
to be
read,
not
as
a
novel
by
a
symbolic
writer,
ut as a
novel about
symbolism.
f
objects
of a
symbolic
ature
oom
large
n
this
work,
t
s
not
because
they
werechosen
to underline
he
theme f
adulteryn somedecorativemanner, ut ratherbecause thereal un-
derlying
ubject
is
precisely
he
surrender
ver
into the
power
of
symbols
f
people
who
have
lost their
autonomy
s human
beings.
"When
people
sink to
this
evel,
even the life
of
apparently
ifeless
things
rows
trong.
Gundolf
uite rightly
nderlined
he
crucial
role
of
objects
n
this
tory.
Yet
the
ntrusion f the
thing-like
nto
human
life
s
precisely
criterion
f
the
mythical
niverse."
We
are
required
to
read these
symbolic
bjects
to
the
second
power:
not so
much
directly
o
decipher
one-to-one
meaning
from
hem,
s to sense
that
of
whichtheveryfactofsymbolisms itself ymptomatic.
And
as
with
the
objects,
o
also
with the
characters:
it
has for
example
often
been
remarked hat
the
figure
f
Ottilie,
the
rather
saintly
young
woman
around
whom
the
drama
turns,
s somehow
differentn its mode
of
characterization
rom he
other,
more
real-
istically
nd
psychologically
rawncharacters.
For
Benjamin
however
this
s
not
so
much a
flaw,
r
an
inconsistency,
s a clue:
Ottilie
s
not
reality
but
appearance,
nd
it
is
this which
the
rather xternal
and
visual
mode
of characterization
onveys.
"It is
clear
that
these
Goethean
characters
ome beforeus not
so much
as
figures haped
fromxternalmodels,norwholly maginaryn their nvention, ut
rather
ntranced
omehow,
s
though
under
a
spell.
Hence
a
kind
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FREDWTC
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of
obscurity
bout
them which
is
foreign
o the
purely
visual,
to
painting
or
nstance,
nd
which
s characteristic
nly
of
that whose
very
ssence
s
pure
appearance.
For
appearance
s
in
this
work
not
so
much
presented
s
a theme s it s rather
mplicit
n
the
very
nature
and
mode
of
the
presentation
tself."
This
moral
dimension
of
Benjamin's,
work,
like
Goethe's
own,
clearlyrepresents
n
uneasy
balance,
a
transitional
moment
etween
the
psychological
n
the one
hand,
and the esthetic r
the
historical
on
the
other.
The
mind
cannot
long
be
satisfied
with
this
purely
ethicaldescriptionf the events fthebookas thetriumphffateful,
mythical
orces;
t strains
or
historical
nd social
explanation,
nd
at
length Benjamin
himself s
forced
to
express
the conclusion
"that
the writer hrouds
n silence:
namely,
hat
passion
oses
all its
rights,
under
the
laws
of
genuine
human
morality,
when
it seeks to
make
a
pact
with
wealthy
middle-class
ecurity."
But
in
Benjamin's
work,
this nevitable
lippage
of
morality
nto
history
nd
politics,
harac-
teristic f
all
modern
thought,
s
mediated
by
esthetics,
s
revealed
by
attention
o
the
qualities
of
the
work
of
art,
ust
as
the above
conclusion
was
articulated
y
the
analysis
f
those
spects
f
Elective
Affinities
hat
might
best have been described s
allegorical
rather
than
symbolic.
For
in
one
sense
Benjamin's
ife
work an
be
seen
as
a kindof
vast
museum,
passionate
ollection,
f
all
shapes
and varieties
f
allegor-
ical
objects;
and
his most ubstantial
work
centers
n
that enormous
studio
of
allegorical
ecoration
which s
the
Baroque.
The
Origins
not so
muchof
German
tragedy
"Tragödie)
-
as
of
German
Trauerspiel:
the
distinction,
or
which
English
has
no
equivalent,
s
crucial to
Benjamin's
interpretation.
or
"tragedy,"
which he limits o ancientGreeceas a phenomenon,s a sacrificial
drama
in
which the hero
is offered
p
to the
Gods
for
atonement.
Trauerspiet,
n
the other
hand,
which
encompasses
he
baroque
gen-
erally,
lizabethans
nd Calderon
s
well as
the
17th
entury
erman
playwrights,
s
something
hat
might
best
be
initially
haracterized
as a
pageant:
a
funereal
pageant
-
so
might
the
word
be
most
adequately
endered.
As a
form t
reflects he
baroque
vision of
history
s
chronicle,
s
the relentless
urning
f
the
wheel of
fortune,
ceaseless
succession
across
the
stage
of the
world's
mighty,
rinces,popes,
empresses
n
their plendidcostumes, ourtiers,maskeradersnd poisoners, a
dance of death
produced
with ll
the
finery
f a Renaissance
riumph.
For
chronicle
s not
yet
historicity
n
the
modern
ense:
"No
matter
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how
deeply
the
baroque
intention
enetrates
he detail
of
history,
its
microscopic
nalysis
never
ceases to
search
painstakingly
or
political
calculation
in
a substance een
as
pure
intrigue.
Baroque
drama knows
historical
vents
only
as
the
depraved
activity
f
con-
spirators.
Not
a
breath
f
genuine
revolutionary
onviction
n
any
of
the
countless
ebels
who
appear
before he
baroque
sovereign,
imself
immobilized
n
the
posture
f
a Christian
martyr.
Discontent
such
is
the classic motivefor
ction."
And
such
historical
ime,
mere
suc-
cession
without
development,
s
in
reality
ecretly
patial,
and
takes
thecourt and thestage) as itsprivileged patial embodiment.
At first
lance,
t
would
appear
that this
vision
of
life as chronicle
is
in
The
Origins
of
German
Tragedy, pre-Marxist
ork,
ccounted
for
n
an
idealisticmanner: as
Lutherans,
enjamin
ays,
the German
baroque
playwrights
new
world
n whichbelief
was
utterlyeparate
from
works,
n which
not
even the Calvinistic
preordained
armony
intervenes o
restore little
meaning
o
the succession
f
empty
cts
that
make
up
human
ife,
he
world
thus
remaining
s
a
body
without
a
soul,
as
the
shell
of an
object
divested
f
any
visible function.
Yet
it
is
at least
ambiguous
whether
his
intellectual
nd
metaphysical
position auses the psychological xperience hat is at the heart of
baroque
tragedy,
r whether t is
not
itself
merely
ne
of
the various
expressions,
elatively
bstract,
hrough
which
an acute
and concrete
emotion
ries
o manifest
tself.
For
the
key
to
the
atter
s the central
enigmatic
figure
f the
prince
himself,
halfway
between
a
tyrant
justly
assassinated
and a
martyr
uffering
is
passion:
interpreted
allegorically,
e stands s
the
embodiment
f
Melancholy
n
a stricken
world,
nd
Hamlet is his
most
complete
xpression.
This
interpreta-
tion
of
the
funereal
pageant
as
a basic
expression
f
pathological
melancholy as theadvantageofaccounting oth forform nd con-
tent
at
the same
time.
Content
n the ense of the
characters'
motivations:
The indecision
of
the
prince
s
nothing
ut
saturnine
cedia.
The
influence f
Saturn
makes
people
apathetic,
ndecisive,
low.*
7hc
tyrant
alls
on
account
of
the
sluggishness
f
his
emotions.
n
the
same
fashion,
he character
of
the
courtier
s
marked
by
faithlessness
another
rait
f
the
pre-
dominance
of
Saturn.
The
courtier
s
mind,
as
portrayed
n these
tragedies,
s
fluctuation
tself:
betrayal
s his
very
lement.
t
is to be
attributed
either
o hastiness
f
composition
or
to
insufficient
har-
acterizationhatthe parasites n theseplays scarcelyneed any time
for
eflection
t all
before
etraying
heir ords
and
going
over to
the
enemy.
Rather,
he lack
of
character vident
n their
ctions,
partly
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FREDRIC
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consciousMachiavellianism
o be
sure,
reflects n
inconsolable,
es-
pondent
urrender
o an
impenetrable
onjunction
f
balefulconstel-
lations,
conjunction
hat eems
to have
taken on
a
massive,
lmost
thing-like
haracter.
Crown,
royal
purple,
cepter,
ll
are
in the
last
analysis
the
properties
f the
tragedy
f
fate,
nd
they carry
about
them an
aura of
destiny
o
which
the
courtier s
the
first
o
submit
as
to
some
portent
f
disaster.
His
faithlessness o
his
fellow
men
corresponds
o the
deeper,
more
contemplative
aith he
keeps
with
these material
mblems."
Once again Benjamin's ensitivitys for thosemomentsn which
human
beings
findthemselves
iven
over
into
the
power
of
things;
and
the
familiar ontent
f
baroque tragedy
that
melancholy
which
we
recognize
rom
amlet
those ices
of
melancholy
lust,
reason,
sadism
-
so
predominant
n the
lesser
Elizabethans,
n Webster
for
Instance veers bout
slowly
nto
a
question
f
form,
nto
the
prob-
lem
of
objects,
which s
to
say
of
allegory
tself.
or
allegory
s
pre-
cisely
the
dominant
mode of
expression
f a world
in
which
things
have been
for
whatever
eason
utterly
undered
from
meanings,
rom
spirit,
rom
enuine
human
existence.
And in the
light
ofthisnew examination f the
baroque
from he
point
f
view
of
form
ather
han
of
content,
ittle
by
little
he
brood-
ing
melancholy
igure
t
the center
f
the
play
himself
lters
n
focus,
the
hero of
the
funereal
ageant
ittle
by
little
becomes
transformed
into
the
baroque
playwright
imself,
he
allcgorist
ar
excellence,
n
Benjamin's
erminology
he
Grübler:
hat
uperstitious,
verparticular
reader f
omens
who
returns
n a
more
nervous,
modern
guise
n
the
hysterical
eroes
of
Poe
and
Baudelaire.
"Allegories
re
in the
realm
of
thoughts
hat ruins
re
in the realm
of
things";
nd
it
is
clear
that
Benjaminis himself irst nd foremostmong thesedepressed nd
hyperconscious
isionaries
who
people
his
pages.
"Once
the
object
has beneath
he
brooding
ook of
Melancholy
become
llegorical,
nce
life
hps
flowed
ut
of
it,
the
object
itself emains
behind,
dead,
yet
preserved
or
all
eternity;
t lies
before
he
allegorist,
iven
over
to
him
utterly,
or
good
or
ill.
In other
words,
he
object
tself
s
hence-
forth
ncapable
of
projecting
ny
meaning
on
its
own;
it can
only
take
on that
meaning
which
he
allegorist
ishes
o
end
t.
He
instills
it
with his own
meaning,
himself
escends
to
inhabit
t:
and
this
mustbe understood otpsychologicallyut in an ontological ense.
In
his hands the
thing
n
question
becomes
something
lse,
speaks
of
something
lse,
becomes
for
him the
key
to some
realm
of
hidden
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61
knowledge,
s
whose
emblem
he honors t.
This
is what constitutes
the
natureof
allegory
s
script."
Script
rather han
language,
the letter
ather
han
the
spirit;
nto
this
the
baroque
world
shatters,
trangely
egible
signs
and
emblems
nagging
t
the
too curious
mind,
a
procession
moving
lowly
across
a
stage,
aden
with
occult
ignificance.
n this
ense,
for
he
first
ime
it seems
to me that
allegory
s
restored
o
us
-
not
as
a
gothic
mon-
strosity
f
purely
historical
nterest,
or as
in
C.
S.
Lewis
a
sign
of
the
medieval
health
of the
religious)
spirit,
ut
rather s a
pathology
withwhich n themodernworldwe are onlytoofamiliar.The tend-
ency
of our
own criticism as been
to
exalt
symbol
t
the
expense
of
allegory
even
though
he
privileged
bjectsproposed y
thatcriticism
-
English
mannerism nd Dante
-
are
more
properly
llegorical
n
nature;
n
this,
as in
other
aspects
of
his
sensibility,
enjamin
has
much
n common
with
a writer ike
T.
S.
Eliot).
It
is,
perhaps,
he
expression
f a
value
rather than a
description
f
existing
poetic
phenomena:
forthe
distinction
etween
ymbol
nd
allegory
s that
between a
complete
reconciliation
etween
object
nnd
spirit
and
a
mere
will
to
such reconciliation.The
usefulness
f
Benjamin's
an-
alysis ieshowever n his insistence n a temporal istinctions well:
the
symbol
s the
instantaneous,
he
lyrical,
the
single
moment
n
time;
and this
temporal
imitation
xpressos
perhnps
the
historical
impossibility
n
the modern
world
for
genuine
reconciliation
o
last
in
time,
o be
anything
more
hnn
lyricnl,
ccidental
resent.
llegory
is
on the
contrary
he
privileged
mode
of
our
own
life
in
time,
a
clumsy eciphering
f
meaning
from
moment
o
moment,
he
painful
attempt
o restore
continuity
o
heterogeneous,
isconnected
nstants.
"Where
the
ymbol
s it
fades hows the face
of
Nature
n
the
ight
f
salvation, n allegory t is thefades hippocratica f history
hat
lies
like a frozen
andscape
before
the
eye
of the
beholder.
History
n
everything
hat
it has
of
unseasonable,
painful,
abortive,
xpresses
itself n
that
face
-
nay
rather
n
that
death's
head.
And
as true
as
it
may
be
that
such an
allegorical
mode
is
utterly
acking
in
any
'symbolic'
reedom f
expression,
n
any
classical
harmony
f
feature,
in
anything
uman
-
what
s
expressed
ere
portentously
n
the
form
of a
riddle
s not
only
the
nature
of human
life
n
general,
but
also
the
biographical
historicity
f
the individual
n
its most
natural
and
organically
orrupted
orm.
This
-
the
baroque,
enrthbound
xpo-
sitionof history s the story f theworld'ssuffering is the very
essence
of
allegorical
perception;
istory
akes
on
meaning
only
in
the stations
of its
agony
and
decay.
The
amount
of
meaning
s
in
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FREDRIC
JAMESON
exact
proportion
o
the
presence
of death and
the
power
of
decay,
since
death is
that
which traces the surest ine
between
Physis
and
meaning."
And
what marks
aroque allegory
holds
for he
allegory
f
modern
times,
for Baudelaire
as well:
only
in
the
latter
t
is
interiorized:
"Baroque allegory
aw the
corpse
from
he
outside
only.
Baudelaire
sees it from
within."
Or
again:
"Commemoration
Andenken]
s the
secularized ersion
f
the adoration
f
holy
relics
.
.
Commemoration
is the
complement
o
experience.
n
commemoration
here
finds x-
pression heincreasing lienationofhumanbeings,who takeinven-
tories f
their
ast
s
of
ifeless
merchandise.
n the nineteenth
entury
allegory
bandons
the outside
world,
nly
to colonizethe
nner.
Relics
come
from
he
corpse,
ommemoration
rom
he dead
occurrences
f
the
past
which
re
euphemistically
nown
s
experience."
Yet in these
ate
essays
on
modern
iterature
new
preoccupation
appears,
which
signals
the
passage
in
Benjamin
from
he
predomin-
antly
esthetic
o the
historical nd
political
dimension
tself.
This
is
the
attention o
machines,
o
mechanical
nventions,
hich
character-
istically
irst
ppears
n
the
realm of esthetics
tself
n the
study
of
the movies "The
Reproduceable
Work of Art") and only later is
extended o the
study
f
history
n
general
as
in
the
essay
"Paris
-
Capitol
of
the
19th
Century,"
n which
the
feeling
of
life in
this
period
s
conveyed
y
a
description
f
the
new
objects
nd
inventions
characteristic
f t the
passageways,
he
use
of
cast
ron,
he
Daguer-
rotype
nd
the
panorama,
he
expositions,
dvertising).
t is
import-
ant to
point
ut
thathowever
materialistic
uch
an
approach
o
history
may
seem,
nothing
s farther
romMarxism
han the
stress
n
inven-
tion
and
technique
s
the
primary
ause of
historical
hnnge.
Indeed
it seemsto me that such theories of the kindforwhichthe steam
engine
s
the
ause
of the
ndustrial
evolution,
nd
whichhave
recent-
ly
been rehearsed
yet
again,
in streamlined
modernistic
orm
n
the
works
of
Marshall
McLuhan)
function
s
a
substitute
or
Marxist
historiography
n
the
way
in
which
they
offer
feeling
f
concrete-
ness
comparable
to economic
ubject
matter,
t
the same
time
that
they
dispense
with
any
considération
f
the
human
factors
f
classes
and
of
the
socinl
organization
f
production.
Benjamin's
fascination
ith
the
role of inventions
n
history
eems
to me
most
comprehensible
n
psychological
r esthetic
erms.
f
we
follow, or nstance,his meditation n the role of the passerby nd
the
crowd
n
Baudelaire,
we
find that after he
evocation
of
Baud-
elaire's
physical
and
stylistic
haracteristics,
fter
the
discussion
of
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shock and
organic
defenses
utlined earlier
n
this
essay,
the
inner
logic
of
Benjamin's
material
eads him
to material
nvention:
Com-
fort
solates.
And at the
same
time
t shifts ts
possessor
loserto
the
power
f
physical
mechanisms.
With
the nvention f matches
round
the
middle
of the
century,
here
begins
a.
whole
series of
novelties
which
have
this
in
common
that
they replace
a
complicated
et of
operations
with
a
single
stroke
f
the
hand. This
development
oes
on
in
many
different
pheres
t the
same
time: it
is
evident
mong
others
n
the
telephone,
where
n
place
of
the continuous
movement
withwhichthe crankof theoldermodel had to be turned single
lifting
f
the
receiver
ow
suffices.
mong
he
various
elaborate
ges-
tures
required
o
prepare
the
photographic
pparatus,
hat of
snap-
ping1
the
photograph
was
particularly
onsequential.
Pressing
the
finger
nce is
enough
to
freeze
n
event
for
unlimited ime.
The
ap-
paratus
ends
the
nstant
posthumous
hock,
o
to
speak.
And
beside
tactile
xperiences
f
this kind
we find
optical
ones
as
well,
such
as
the
classified ds in a
newspaper,
r
the
traffic
n a
big
city.
To
move
through
he
atter nvolves
whole
seriesof
shocks
nd
collisions.
At
dangerous
ntersections,
mpulses
risscross
he
pedestrian
ike
charges
ina battery.Baudelairedescribeshemanwhoplunges ntothecrowd
as
a
reservoir f
electrical
energy.
Thereupon
he
calls
him,
thus
singling
ut the
experience
f
shock,
a
kaléidoscope
ndowed
with
consciousness'/1 nd
Benjamin
goes
on
to
complete
this
catalogue
with
a
description
f the
worker
nd
his
psychological
ubjection
o
the
operation
f
the machine n
the
factory.
Yet it seems
to me
that
alongside
he
value of this
passage
as an
analysis
of
the
psychological
effect
f
machinery,
t has
for
Benjamin
a
secondary
ntention,
t
satisfies
deeper psychological
equirement
erhaps
in some
ways
evenmore mportanthanthe officialntellectual ne; and that s to
serve as a concrete mbodiment or
the
state
of
mind
of
Baudelaire.
The
essay
indeed
begins
with
a
relatively
isembodied
sychological
state: the
poet
faced
with the
new
condition
f
language
in modern
times,
acedwith the debasement f
ournalism,
he
nhabitant
f the
great
ity
faced
with
the
increasing
hocks
nd
perceptual
numbness
of
daily
life.
These
phenomena
rc
intensely
amiliar
o
Benjamin,
but
somehow
he
seems
to feel them
as
insufficiently
rendered11:
e
cannot
possess
them
piritually,
e
cannot
express
hem
adequately,
until
he
finds
ome
sharper
and more concrete
physical
image
in
whichto embody hem. The machine, he listof inventions,s pre-
cisely
uch
an
image;
and
it will
be
clear to the
reader
that we
con-
sider
uch a
passage,
n
appearance
historical
nalysis,
s in
reality
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i
FREDRÎC
JAMESON
art
exercise
n
allegorical
méditation,
n
the
locating
of
some
fitting
emblem
n which
to anchorthe
peculiar
nd
nervous
modern
tate of
mind which was his
subject-matter.
For
this reason
the
preoccupation
with
machines
and inventions
in
Benjamin
does
not
lead
to
a
theory
f historical
ausality;
rather
it finds
ts
completion
lsewhere,
n a
theory
f
the
modern
object,
in
the
notion
of "aura."
Aura
for
Benjamin
s the
equivalent
n
the
modern
world,
where
t still
persists,
or
what
anthropologists
all
the
"sacred"
in
primitive
ocieties;
t
is
in the world
of
things
what
"mystery"s in theworldof humanevents,what "charisma" is in
the
world
of
human
beings.
In a
secularized
universe
t
is
perhaps
easier
to ocate
at
the moment f
ts
disappearance,
he
cause of
which
is
in
general
echnical
nvention,
he
replacement
f
human
perception
with
those
substitutes or and
mechanical
extensions
f
perception
which are
machines. Thus
it
is
easy
to
see how
in
the
movies,
n
the
"reproduceable
workof
art,"
that aura
which
originally
esulted
from
the
physical
presence
of
actors
in
the
here-and-now
of
the
theater
s short-circuited
y
the
new technical
advance
(and
then
replaced,
n
genuine
Freudian
ymptom-formation,y
the
attempt
o
endow thestarswitha new kindof
personal
aura of theirown off
the
screen).
Yet
in
theworld
f
objects,
his
ntensity
f
physical
resence
which
constitutes
he aura of
something
an
perhaps
best
be
expressed
y
the
image
of
the
look,
the
intelligence
eturned:
The
experience
f
aura is based on
the
transposition
f
a
social
reaction
nto
the
rela-
tionship
f the lifeless r of nature
to
man.
The
person
we look
at,
the
person
who
believes
himself
ooked
at,
looks
back
at
us in return.
To
experience
he aura of
a
phenomenon
means
to endow
it
with
the
powerto lookback in return."
And
elsewhere
he defines
ura
thus:
"The
single,
unrepeatable
experience
f
distance,
o
matter
ow
close
it
may
be.
While
resting
on a
summer
fternoon,
o
follow
he outline
of
a
mountain
gainst
the
horizon,
r
of a branch
hat
casts
ts
shadow
on the
viewer,
means
to
breaththe
aura
of
the
mountain,
f
the
branch."
Aura
is
thus
n
a
sense the
opposite
f
allegorical
erception,
n
that
n it a
mysterious
wholeness
f
objects
becomes
isible.
And
where
he broken
ragments
of
allegory
epresented
thing-world
f
destructive
orces
n
which
human
autonomy
was
drowned,
he
objects
f aura
represent
erhaps
thesetting f a kindof utopia,a Utopianpresent, ot shornof the
past
but
having
absorbed
t,
a
kind
of
plenitude
f
existence
n
the
world f
things,
f
only
for he
briefest
nstant.
Yet
this
Utopian
om-
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65
portent
f
Benjamin's
hought,
ut
to
flight
s
it
is
by
the mechanized
present
f
history,
s
available
to
the
thinker
nly
n
a
simpler
ultural
past.
Thus it is his
one
evocation f
a
non-allegorical
rt,
his
essay
on
Nikolai
Leskow,
The Teller
of
Tales,"
which
s
perhaps
his
master-
piece.
As
with actors
faced
with
the
technical dvance of
the
repro-
duceable
art-work,
o also with
the
tale in the face of
modern
om-
munications
ystems,
nd in
particular
f the
newspaper.
The function
of
the
newspapers
s to
absorbthe shocks f
novelty,
nd
by
numbing
the organismto themto sap their ntensity.Yet the tale, always
constructed round
some
novelty,
was
designed
on
the
contrary
o
preserve
ts
force;
where he mechanical
orm
exhausts" ver
ncreas-
ing
quantities
f
new
material,
he
older
word-of-mouth
ommunica-
tion
s
that
which
recommends
tself
o
memory.
ts
reproduceability
is
not
mechanical,
but
natural to
consciousness;
ndeed,
that
which
allows
the
story
o be
remembered,
o seem "memorable"
s
at
the
same time
the means
of
its assimilation
o the
personal
xperience
f
the
listeners s
well.
It is
instructiveo
compare
this
analysis by Benjamin
of
the
tale
(and its
implied
distinction rom henovel) withthat of Sartre, o
similar n
some
ways,
and
yet
so different
n its
ultimate
mphasis.
For
both,
he two
forms rc
opposed
not
only
n
their
ocial
origins
the
tale
springing
rom ollective
ife,
he novel
from
olitude
and
not
only
in
their
raw
material
the
talc
using
what
everyone
an
recognize
s common
xperience,
he
novel
that
which
s uncommon
and
highly
ndividualistic
but also
and
primarily
n the
relationship
to
death and
to
eternity. enjamin
quotes
Valéry:
"It is
almost
as
though
the
disappearance
f
the
idea
of
eternity
ere related
to
the
increasing istasteforany kindof workof long duration n time."
Concurrent
with
the
disappearance
of
the
genuine story
s
the
in-
creasing
oncealment
f death and
dying
n
our
society:
for
the au-
thority
f
the
storyultimately
erivesfrom
he
authority
f
death,
which
ends
every
vent
once-and-for-all
niqueness.
"A man
who
died at
the
age
of
thirty-five
s
at
everypoint
n
his
life a man
who
is
going
to
die
at
the
age
of
thirty-five":
o
Benjamin
describes
ur
apprehension
f
characters
n
the
tale,
as the
anti-psychological,
he
simplified
epresentatives
f
their
own
destinies.
But
what
appeals
to
his
sensitivity
o the archaic
s
precisely
what Sartrecondemns
s
inauthentic: amely heviolenceto genuine ivedhumanexperience,
which
never
n
the
freedom f
its
own
present
eels
tself
s
fate,
for
which
fate and
destiny
re
always
characteristic
f other
people's
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66
FREDRÎC
JAMESON
experience,
een
from
he outside
s
something
losed
and
thing-like.
For thisreason
Sartre
pposes
he
tale
(it
is true
hathe
is
thinking
f
the
late-nineteenth
entury
well-made
story,
which
catered
to
a
middle-class
udience,
rather
han to
the
relatively
nonymous
olk
product
f
which
Benjamin
peaks)
to the
novel,
whose
task
s
pre-
cisely
to
render
his
open
experience
f
consciousness
n
the
present,
of
freedom,
ather han
the
optical
llusion
of fate.
There
can be no
doubt
that this
opposition
orresponds
o
a
his-
torical
experience:
the
older
tale,
indeed
the
classical
nineteenth
century ovel as well,expressed social life n whichthe individual
faced
ingle-shot,
rreparable
hances and
opportunities,
n
which
he
had
to
play everything
n
a
single
roll
of
the
dice,
in
which
his
life
did
therefore
roperly
end o
take
on
the
appearance
f
fate
r
destiny,
of a
story
hat can be
told.
Whereas
n the
modern
world
which
is
to
say,
n Western
urope
nd
the United
States),
economic
rosperity
is
such
that
nothing
s ever
really
rrevocable
n this ense:
hence
the
philosophy
f
freedom,
ence the
modernistic
iterature
f conscious-
ness
of
which Sartre
s here
a theorist:
ence
also,
the
decay
of
plot,
for
where
nothing
s
irrevocable
in
the
absence
of
death
in
Ben-
jamin's
sense)
there s no
story
o telleither, here s
only
a seriesof
experiences
f
equal weight
whose
order
s
indiscriminately
eversible.
Benjamin
s
as
aware
as
Sartre
of
the
way
in
which
the
tale,
with
its
appearance
of
destiny,
oes
violence
to
our
lived
experience
n
the
present:
but for
him
it
does
justice
to
our
experience
f
the
past.
Its
"inauthenticity"
s
to
be
seen
as a
mode
of
commemoration,
o
that
it
does
not
really
matter
ny
longer
whether
he
young
man
dead
in
his
prime
was
aware
of
his
own
lived
experience
s
fate:
for
us,
henceforth
emembering
im,
we
always
think
f
him,
at
the
variousstagesof his life, s one about to becomethisdestiny, nd
the tale
thus
gives
us
"
the
hope
of
warming
ur
own
chilly
xistence
upon
a
death
about
which
we
read."
The tale
is not
only
a
psychological
mode
of
relating
o
the
past,
of
commemorating
t:
it
is
for
Benjamin
also
a
mode
of
contact
with
a vanished
form f social
and
historical
xistence
s
well;
and
it
is
in
this
correlation
between
the
activity
of
story-telling
nd
the
concrete
orm f
a
certain
historically
eterminate
mode
of
production
that
Benjamin
can
serve
as
a
model
of
Marxist
iterary
riticism
t
its
most
revealing.
The
twin
ources
f
story-telling
ind
heir
rchaic
embodimentn "the settled ultivator n the one hand and thesea-
faring
merchant
n
the
other.
Both
forms
f
life
have
in
fact
pro-
duced
their wn
characteristic
ype
of
story-teller
..
A
genuine
ex-
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67
tension f the
possibilities
f
tory-telling
o
ts
greatest
istorical
ange
is
howevernot
possible
without
he most
horough-going
usion f
the
two archaic
types.
Such a
fusionwas
realized
during
he
middle
ges
in
the artisanal
ssociations
nd
guilds.
The
sedentary
master
nd
the
wandering pprentices
worked
together
n
the
same
room;
indeed,
every
master
had himself een a
wandering pprentice
efore
ettling
down at home
or in
some
foreign
ity.
If
peasants
and sailors
were
the inventors f
story-telling,
he
guild
system
roved
to be the
place
of
ts
highest
evelopment."
he
tale is
thus
the
product
f
an artisan
culture, hand-madeproduct,ikea cobbler's hoe or a pot;and like
such
a
hand-made
object,
"the
touch of the
story-teller
lings
to it
like the trace
of
the
potter's
and on the
glazed
surface."
In
his ultimate
tatement f the
relationship
f
iterature
o
politics,
Benjamin
eems to have
tried
o
bring
o
bear
on
the
problems
f
the
present
his
method,
which had
known success
in
dealing
with
the
objects
f
the
past.
Yet the
transposition
s not without
ts
difficulties,
and
Benjamin's
conclusions
emain
problematical,
articularly
n
his
unresolved,
mbiguous
attitudetowards
modern
ndustrial
iviliza-
tion,
whirh
fascinated
im
as much
s it seems
to have
depressed
im.
The problem f propaganda n art can be solved,he maintains, y
attention,
ot
so
much
to the
content
f the
work of
art,
as
to its
form:
progressive
ork
f
art
s
one
which
utilizes
he
most
dvanced
artistic
echniques,
ne
in
which
therefore
he
artist
ives his
activity
as
a
technician,
nd
through
his technical
work
findsa
unity
of
purpose
with
the industrial
worker.
The
solidarity
f
the
specialist
with the
proletariat
. .
con never
be
anything
ut a mediated ne."
This
communist
politicalisation
f
art,"
which
he
opposed
to
the
fascist
estheticalisation
f
the
machine,"
was
designed
o
harness
to
the cause ofrevolutionhatmodernismowhich otherMarxist ritics
(Lukacs,
for
nstance)
were hostile.
And
there
an
be
no doubt
that
Benjamin
first ame to a
radical
politics
hrough
is
experience
s
a
specialist:
through
is
growing
wareness,
withinthe domain
of
his
own
specialized
rtistic
ctivity,
f
the
crucial
nfluence
n
the
work
of
art
of
changes
n
the
public,
n
technique,
n short
f
History
tself.
But
although
n
the
realm of
the
history
f
art the
historian
an
no
doubt
show
a
parallelism
between
specific
echnical
advances
in a
given
art and the
general development
f
the
economy
s
a
whole,
it
is
difficult
o
see
how
a
technically
dvanced
and
difficult
ork of
artcan have anything ut a "mediated"effect olitically. enjamin
was
of
course
ucky
n the
artistic
xample
which
ay
before
im:
for
he
illustrates
is thesis
with
the
epic
theater
f
Brecht,
erhaps
ndeed
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68
FREDRIC
JAMESON
the
only
modern
rtistic nnovation hat
has
had direct
nd
revolu-
tionary olitical
mpact.
But even
here the situation
s
ambiguous:
an
astute
ritic
Rolf
Tiedemann)
has
pointed
ut
the
secret elation-
ship
between
Benjamin's
fondness
or Brecht
on
the
one hand and
"his
ifelong
ascination ith
hildren's ooks"
on
the
other
children's
books:
hieroglyphs: simplified llegorical
emblems
and
riddles).
Thus,
where
we
thought
o
emerge
ntothehistorical
resent,
n
reality
we
plunge
again
into the distant
past
of
psychological
bsession.
But if
nostalgia
as a
political
motivation
s most
frequently
sso-
ciatedwithfascism,here s no reasonwhya nostalgiaconsciousof
itself,
lucid
and remorseless
issatisfaction
ith
the
present
n the
grounds
f
some remembered
lenitude,
annot
furnish
s
adequate
a
revolutionary
timulus s
any
other:
the
example
of
Benjamin
is
there o
prove
t. He
himself,
owever,
referred
o
contemplate
is
destiny
n
religious
magery,
s
in
the
following
aragraph,
ccording
to Gershom
cholem
the
last he
ever
wrote:
"Surely
Time
was felt
neither
s
empty
or
as
homogeneous y
the
soothsayers
ho
inquired
for
what it hid in its
womb.
Whoever
keeps
this
in
mind
is in
a
position
o
grasp ust
how
past
time
s
experienced
n
commemoration:
in
just
exactly
hesame
way.
As is well
known,
he
Jews
werefor-
bidden to search into
the
future.
On
the
contrary,
he
Thora
and
the act of
prayer
nstruct
hem n
commemoration
f
the
past.
So for
them,
the
future,
o
which
the clientele
of
soothsayers
emains
n
thrall,
s
divested
f its sacred
power.
Yet
it does
not
for
all
that
become
imply
mpty
nd
homogeneous
ime
n
their
yes.
For
every
second of
the future ears
within t that
little door
through
which
Messiah
may
enter."
Angélus
novus:
Benjamin's
favorite
mage
of
the
angel
that
exists
onlyto sing tshymn fpraisebefore heface ofGod, to givevoice,
and
then t
once
to
vanish
back
into uncreated
othingness.
o
at its
most
poignant
Benjamin's
xperience
f
time:
a
pure
present,
n
the
threshold f
the
future
onoring
t
by
averted
yes
in meditation
n
the
past.