Opinion of Walter Benjamin

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I've just discovered him and am as yet unsure of what to make of him. I'm at this moment reading THAT part of Theses on the Philosophy of History; some of us, I should think, will know the one.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Exceedingly high.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Anyways, when you write 'unsure' what do you mean?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Basically that Theses on the Philosophy of History at once powerfully reinforced some of my preconceptions and beliefs and powerfully challenged others and that, while I was blown away by it and don't think I or anybody else can really afford to ignore its critiques (particularly IX, dear God, IX...), not having (yet) read much else by Benjamin I'm not sure how it's to be contextualized within his broader thought. A professor of my acquaintance has been trying to get me to read Benjamin for years and I've just now started.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Oh, it's very typical of his thinking and his main intellectual projects and preoccupations. You should have a dip into the Arcades project at some point.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

The Arcades Project was a sort of massive discourse on the civic landscape of modern Paris, right? I've heard of it and it's the work that this professor was largely concerned with, but she warned me off of starting with it because it's hugely long and complex.

That, of course, really makes me want to read it when I get some time on my hands.

[Insula Dei]

You're also supposed to read The Work of Art in the Age of its Mechanical Reproduction (as wikipedia tells me you ought to translate it. Not happy with Reproduzierbarkeit-Reproduction, but hey.)