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Illuminations

by Walter Benjamin, Hannah Arendt (Editor), Harry Zohn (Translator)

4.34 of 5 stars 4.34 · rating details · 3,619 ratings · 123 reviews

The literary-philosophical works of Walter Benjamin (1892-1940) rank among the most quietly influential of the post-war era, though only since his death has Benjamin achieved the fame and critical currency outside his native Germany accorded him by a select few during his lifetime. Now he is widely held to have possessed one of the most acute and original minds of the Cent...more

Paperback, 272 pages

Published January 7th 1999 by Pimlico (first published 1950)

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Sep 29, 2010 Elizabeth rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Book nerds resisting digital media (fight the power)

Shelves: books-about-books, non-fiction, essays, reviewed

This is the friendly side of Walter Benjamin:

I have made the most memorable purchases on trips, as a transient. Property and possession belong to the tactical sphere. Collectors are people with a tactical instinct; their experience teaches them that when they capture a strange city, the smallest antique shop can be a fortress, the most remote stationery store a key position. How many cities have revealed themselves to me in the marches I undertook in the pursuit of books!

Usually, when people...more

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Mar 16, 2012 Chris rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The introductory essay by Hannah Arendt—who also did duty as editor of this wonderful collection—serves up her usual insight (and reliably delivered via her rather dense language) in categorizing Benjamin as a poetic mind who approached cultural and literary criticism in a unique manner, one that left a lasting influence upon those who followed in his wake. Benjamin's opening sally, a short piece on the eccentric inner workings of the book collector, resonated in a warmly satisfying way, describ...more

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Aug 04, 2007 Kian rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The essays collected here are all good to excellent. However, Harry Zohn's translations are appalling! The piece on translation is garbled into nonsense, basically, and the less said about the rendering into English of the artwork essay the better. Best to stick to the edition put out by Harvard University Press fairly recently.

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Apr 01, 2011 Ian Graye rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: reviews, reviews-5-stars, to-read-3m

Sentimentality
I still talk about "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" 30 years after I first read it.
I don't remember it as a purely political tract, even though that is how it is all dressed up.
I think he displayed some degree of sentimentality and attachment to the original work of art. Its uniqueness, its cult value, its authenticity, its ability to "illuminate".
Ironically, the way that we relate to mechanically reproduced books now replicates this sentimentality, even thou...more

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Jan 03, 2011 Joe rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: critical-theory, dialectic, history, literature, marxism, political-thought, reviewed

Review:

August 2006

Of Benjamin, Dwarfs and Angels

The depth of Benjamin's pessimism has, I think, been underestimated.

"The story is told of an automation constructed in such a way that it could play a winning game of chess, answering each move of an opponent with a countermove. A puppet in Turkish attire and with a hookah in its mouth sat before a chessboard placed on a large table. A system of mirrors created the illusion that this table was transparent from all sides. Actually, a little hunchba...more

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Aug 11, 2007 Arielle rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Scary to read this now - relevant and haunting. Beautiful, dark prose. Brilliant and shadowy and mind-blowingly astute. Modern always in its observations and personal experience. His is the experience of all of us in a floating, unstable world. History and the present moment are the same - there is no time in Benjamin - and he tries desperately to teach us something. He listens to the world, the almost inaudible, and writes it faithfully and sadly.

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Dec 30, 2010 El Zuco rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I never realized the heights to which literary criticism could soar before I read Benjamin, and his work is worthy of Bolaño's assertion that literary criticism is another valid branch on the literary tree along with the novel, poetry, etc., etc. Comparing Benjamin with the mostly North American criticism I've read, the latter seems to shrink to the status of mere informative journalism, a literary mode Benjamin critiqued for its limits in time and space (the news almost always only addresses th...more I never realized the heights to which literary criticism could soar before I read Benjamin, and his work is worthy of Bolaño's assertion that literary criticism is another valid branch on the literary tree along with the novel, poetry, etc., etc. Comparing Benjamin with the mostly North American criticism I've read, the latter seems to shrink to the status of mere informative journalism, a literary mode Benjamin critiqued for its limits in time and space (the news almost always only addresses the near and now) as compared to the story, which embodies the experience of the teller and is embodied in the experience of the attentive listener. Benjamin is best read carefully to the point where one loses oneself, just like the listeners of the storytellers in his essay on Leskov listen intently in the rhythm of their work; as a result the story is absorbed in their experience, allowing them to remember it and pass it on. An altogether different experience than reading the news, and a traditional practice that has all but perished in our West. As someone somewhere already said, Benjamin’s sentences seem to slow to a near stillness in order to contemplate their object, and require the contemplation akin to that of the flâneur, another personage who captivated Benjamin’s interest.

Benjamin’s essays on Proust, Kafka, Baudelaire, translation, and other topics develop specific theses about their objects but also correspond through shared contemplations about experience, tradition and memory, which give us a window into Benjamin’s concerns & thought. Benjamin’s way of finding correspondences, between diverse material and historical aspects of an epoch and the production of its artists, between the substructure and superstructure, is done often metaphorically, and Hannah Arendt describes his way of thinking as poetic. Benjamin brings a poetic aspect to analysis rooted in marxist concerns, which is really fantastic to experience.

It’s not that I’ve read much, but I’ve never read anything so unique, and I’m looking forward to reading more Benjamin. If you’re interested in this kind of thing, do yourself a favor and pick up some Walter Benjamin. It is to be read extremely attentively, and even then much may pass you by. With regard to technique: pretend you don’t live in the dawn of the 21st century and try to slow down the passing of your time so much you can actually see. (Of course, Benjamin also has some interesting things to say about the masses, art, and distracted perception, but that’s if you make it to the end of the last essay).
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Jan 25, 2009 James rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: essays, lit-criticism, philosophy, study-group, u-of-chicago, mitteleuropa, history-of-ideas

This book is a valuable collection of essays and reflections by the German literary and cultural critic Walter Benjamin. The collection is enhanced by the excellent introduction provided by Hannah Arendt. Of the ten essays in the collection by far the most famous is The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. In this essay Benjamin discusses the impact of mechanical reproduction through photography and film on the nature of works of art, even so far as to shape the design of new works...more

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Dec 16, 2009 Clint rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book was heading towards five stars just as quickly as I could read it until I got to the last 2 essays, when Benjamin decides to get really political and Marxist and tries to convince the reader that the cut and paste nature of film reflects the industrialized blah blah blah blah. The first part, actually almost all this book is 5-star material, GREAT, simple, modest essays and thoughts on various aspects of art, books, etc. And I can't wait to read Reflections, but I don't know if I can s...more

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Jun 24, 2009 David rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Hannah Arendt put these together, the classic collection of his work that American readers are more likely to be familiar with. I recommend to anyone. He had such energy; there is an exuberant joy in his writing about arts, culture, and literature and it is a pleasure to feel oneself in his company for a while. Among his better known writing in this collection are the essay on Kafka (which is also a general, loping meditiation on culture and literature) and the essay on the writer Nicolai Leskov...more

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Sep 09, 2010 Anom Astika rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Sejak ku temui buku ini di tahun 1990an belum sampai tuntas aku membaca semuanya. Ada banyak artikel di dalamnya, dan masing masingnya menawarkan gagasan yang menarik dari Benjamin. Baru pada saat aku mengambil mata kuliah filsafat sejarah di STF Driyarkara, dan kuliah filsafat teknologi di tempat yang sama, aku kembali membaca buku ini. Lebih ku dalami lagi pembacaan terhadap Theses on Philosophy of History ketika aku mulai berlibat dalam Komunitas Marx STF Driyarkara, saat mendiskusikan proble...more

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Jul 02, 2012 Alex rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

These essays are chiefly memorable for:

1) The one about the dwarf that lives under the chessboard.
2) The one about how he has too many books but they are all his children.
3) The one where Kafka has a headache, but everyone keeps asking him for favors.
4) The one where Proust eats a cookie.
5) The one in which they lose the aura.
6) The one where the gang all wear translations as baggy coats.
7) The one where Baudelaire gets lost in a crowd.
8) The one with the Hannah Arendt encomium to Walter Benjami...more

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May 13, 2008 lisa_emily rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: literary-intellectual-studies

Reading Benjamin makes me realize how 98% of the conversations I have are a waste of time. His depth reaches far and his reading spreads vast.

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Apr 08, 2013 Eddy Allen rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: arts-and-historical

Studies on contemporary art and culture by one of the most original, critical and analytical minds of this century. Illuminations includes Benjamin's views on Kafka, with whom he felt the closest personal affinity, his studies on Baudelaire and Proust (both of whom he translated), his essays on Leskov and on Brecht's Epic Theater.

Also included are his penetrating study on "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," an illuminating discussion of translation as a literary mode, and hi...more

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Jun 15, 2009 Geoff rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Benjamin's writings on Proust, Kafka, Baudelaire and Leskov are really brilliant and engrossing. I was especially taken with his history of the storyteller in relation to Leskov's stories, how the verbal communication that was the initial component of storytelling dissipated after the fragmenting of human experience that came along with the realities of the industrial revolution and the barbarism of World War I, as if history itself killed mankind's ability to actually feel and process experienc...more

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Aug 20, 2007 Rachel rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Marxists; rebels; theological readers; cultural critics

I could have gone nowhere without Walter Benjamin.

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Dec 02, 2012 Claire Cray rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Five years ago I discovered Walter Benjamin. I had never been much for theory before, and my initial encounter with his writing was sort of like one of those old 3D puzzle pictures: first, a dense field of mesmerizing psychedelic prose, and then POW! MEANING!

I don't gush over philosophy often, I swear (okay, I don't swear swear, but like, 89% swear) -- but this is love. His haunting theories and beautiful metaphors have stayed on my mind ever since that sunny afternoon in Portland, Oregon when I...more

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Dec 11, 2011 Caroline rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I'm so eager to grow very old with this book. I read it over a year and more, so can't (sorry) remember it well enough to review. The Proust stuff is freshest in my memory, and most relevant ("regarding proust, i just had to put him down, because albertine died and that's too much for me....." - b) so please just enjoy the romantic excerpts below:

On memory:

"The important thing for the remembering author is not what he experienced, but the weaving of his memory, the Penelope work of recollection....more

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May 13, 2011 Bradley rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

What the hell was Hannah Arendt smoking in selecting these essays to include in what was to be the definitive Benjamin Reader. Most of these are essays about writers that are totally irrelevant today (with the only notable exception being Kafka). The only essays that are worth reading and rereading in my opinion are the Theses on History and Art in the Mechanical Age of Reproduction (but there are various titles depending on which translation you use).

Only other essay by Benjamin worth reading...more

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Sep 15, 2009 Saxon rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: theory-n-shit

Benjamin's essays do not necessarily work within a field of philosophy that builds upon previous theories and drives towards a "greater point" but rather, they work more as conversations. He picks and pulls from various sources that may not seem to relate immediately but still work and assist in the various musings that he explores throughout his essays. He is not so much trying to convince you of anything but rather, in examining the works of Kafka, Baudelaire or epic theater, attempts to pull...more Benjamin's essays do not necessarily work within a field of philosophy that builds upon previous theories and drives towards a "greater point" but rather, they work more as conversations. He picks and pulls from various sources that may not seem to relate immediately but still work and assist in the various musings that he explores throughout his essays. He is not so much trying to convince you of anything but rather, in examining the works of Kafka, Baudelaire or epic theater, attempts to pull out interesting aspects of these works, how they are influenced by or comment on society, history and western culture.

Benjamin style is rather refreshing in that his commentary is enlightening but does not require much previous knowledge of a specific field of thought or even the subject or work he is writing about to gain something insightful. This characteristic of Benjamin makes his essays all that more welcoming especially for someone who has approached this book on their own time and not in an academic setting.
However, I can see how many of these essays might not interest someone who is use to institutionalized, academic methods of obtaining knowledge but if you have hefty love for literature and art then this comes highly suggested.

This collection also includes one of Benjamin's most famous pieces, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" which in examining the effect of photography and film upon art coincidently explores the greater political ramifications in the sudden ability to reproduce art en masse to and for the masses. This is undoubtedly required reading for anyone interested in cultural theory or the politics of art.

From that essay I offer you this little selection which seemingly holds relevance today:

"For centuries a small number of writers were confronted with many thousands of readers. This changed towards the end of the last century. With the extension of the press...an increasing number of readers became writers--at first, occasional ones. It began with the daily press opening to its readers space for "letter to the editor." And today, there is hardly a gainfully employed European who could not, in principle, find an opportunity to publish somewhere or other comments on his work, grievances, doucumentary reports, or that sort thing. Thus the distinction between author and public is about to lose its basic character...At any moment the reader is ready to turn into the writer."

Did Benjamin, in the early 1900's, properly characterize the entire transformation of written word leading to the advent, creation and popularity of the internet, blogs and this very website? An argument could probably be made.
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Oct 07, 2008 Mr. rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

In 1940 Walter Benjamin committed suicide at the Franco-Spanish border fearing that he would be unable to escape the grasp of Hitler's regime. He left behind perhaps one of the finest collections of literary theory of his era, complete with lucidly brilliant essays on Kafka, Proust, Baudelaire, and general Marxist theory.

In this wholly excellent collection of essays, a remarkable introduction to Benjamin's life and work is provided by the late philosopher Hannah Arendt, who overviews his politi...more

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Feb 15, 2008 Yumi rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: theory-and-ish, all-time-favorites, dissertation

the two most widely read pieces from this collection are probably "the work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction" and "theses on the philosophy of history," both of which are, in my opinion, absolutely necessary works to scrutinize for any student of cultural studies, be it in the guise of film, literature, history, and whathaveyou.

benjamins prose is lean; as with many theorists, there are parts that will leave you scratching your head and reading over and over again to make sense of hi...more

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Jul 21, 2009 Gabriel rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The essay, we say, reformed high school students all, is like a building.

First, we lay its foundations. Then, we join together its framework. When all is finally seamless, we paint it and furnish it.

As readers, then, we enter through a doorway, carefully designed to allow such entry, stand on a floor that is sufficiently strong to hold us up, and find ourselves enclosed by walls that keep the elements and other creatures out.

For Benjamin, these rules do not apply. His essays are not built. The...more The essay, we say, reformed high school students all, is like a building.

First, we lay its foundations. Then, we join together its framework. When all is finally seamless, we paint it and furnish it.

As readers, then, we enter through a doorway, carefully designed to allow such entry, stand on a floor that is sufficiently strong to hold us up, and find ourselves enclosed by walls that keep the elements and other creatures out.

For Benjamin, these rules do not apply. His essays are not built. They are not houses. They are more closely allied to the collection, assembled by nature, neither at random nor through artifice: as in his "Arcades" project, Benjamin's closest parallel is the flaneur (a subject he treats in his essay on Baudelaire), and his light, appreciative, and essentially motile nature. These essays are accumulations, not architecture; where another thinker might aim his words to a point in the distance, Benjamin is happy to take in what is in front of him, and tries to make you comfortable doing the same.

Which is not to say that Benjamin's essays are pointless or easily satisfied. That would miss the essence of the flaneur-- motion. Like the farrago of stalls in the Paris arcades, Benjamin's essays are filled to the brim with brilliant little points of interest, nearly always hidden by yet other brilliant points of interest. It is quite easy to get stopped, lose all forward momentum, and stare gap-mouthed at some odd trinket, and it is equally tempting to simply skip through barely taking notice of the various stalls in your quest for something particular, but to do either would be a mistake.

The flaneur's walk, as Benjamin explains, is a very slow pace-- almost but not quite stopping with every step. This allows the flaneur to speculate on everything he takes in, encourages it even. Actually taking it in. But he does not stop. To stop would be to admit a purpose in the flaneur's walk, and there is no purpose other than the walk itself. It may begin and end anywhere.

So too with Benjamin's essays. Because they are not buildings, they have no entryways. You can enter them wherever you find a way to enter them, and then proceed in whatever direction seems best to you at that time. Because they are not building floors underneath you, you don't need to worry that you will run out of space, run into a wall. Nor should you worry terribly that you might "miss the point." It isn't that there isn't one, it is that there isn't one. There are many: they are all around. Take a step, take another. Along the way, see what there is to see. Repeat.(less)

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Sep 29, 2007 Baiocco rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Those Planning The Revolution

Shelves: essays

Walter Benjamin, writing his greatest work while constantly evading Nazi Persecution for being a Jew, was one of the most influential and compassionate cultural critics and intellectual revolutionaries of the Twentieth Century. Illuminations is a series of essays and reflections on some of his literary interests (Kafka, Proust, Baudelaire) as well as some of his most powerful writing about the culture at large (Art In The Age Of Mechanical Reproduction). This essay gave me goosebumps when I rea...more

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Jun 29, 2009 J. Dunn rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: nonfiction, essays, 20th-century, german, translations, litcrit, semiotics, modernist, postmodernism, culture, historiography, aesthetics, media, owned, favorite, find-etext

The bit about the angel of history is one of my favorite passages anywhere. A chilling epitaph for the first half of the 20th Century, and one of the enduring images for me of that maelstrom of modernism and destruction and acceleration. Lots of other great stuff in here too, but I can't remember much except some interesting thoughts on translation and trenchant criticism on Kafka. Oh, and of course the famous Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, but I can't say that left much of a...more

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Mar 13, 2011 Michael rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Walter Benjamin is one of the great essayists of the 20th Century and, along with Poe, one of the inventors of literary criticism. This collection of essays is wide-randing and reflects Benjamin's varied interests in literature, philosophy and art. Of particular import is The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, and evalation of technology on art and artistic production. Benjamin is a genius and his essays are well worth reading.

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Jul 04, 2010 Joseph rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

When asked how he would describe Sandy Koufax, Vin Scully said, "Oh, a genius."

Those are the words I would use for Walter Benjamin. A bit of an obscurity in his lifetime, after he died attempting to escape Europe in the early years of World War II, his reputation rightly grew. This book is the best possible introduction to Benjamin's work, and includes the life-changing essays "The Storyteller" and "12 Theses on the Philosophy of History".

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Nov 19, 2009 Jeremy added it · review of another edition

Shelves: philosophy, politics, sociological

Benjamin never ceases to impress, his critical approach and analysis is consistently one of the most orginal and compelling that I've come across. He examines the texts and the world around him with a sort of deft skill that you can't help but envy, always finding a fresh perspective from which to challenge conventional interpretations Reading through these made me want to go back and reaxmine 'one way street' and the 'aracades project' all over again.

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Nov 12, 2010 Adrian Alvarez rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Benjamin (pronounced BEN-ya-mean) is one of those writers you just can't help loving in a sort of "oh poor Walter" way. His longing for an "aura" even as it seems to be dissolving before his very eyes is so likable and so tragic that you just want to give the guy a hug.

Certainly his life's tragedy leans over the edge of the reader's shoulder and one really can't separate the ideas in these essays from the idea of Walter Benjamin: a guy who's been dealt none of the right cards, can't figure himse...more

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Jan 23, 2010 Andrea rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: theory

I love Walter Benjamin, entering this strange world of his, watching his thinking in ripples about Kafka, Baudelaire, Proust, Leskov and fascism, art, life, history. Not that I understand everything of course, but I find inspiration here. He is what a friend calls a constellation of insights (something of a quote of Benjamin himself in fact, who collects quotations as I do).

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About Walter Benjamin

Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin was a German-Jewish Marxist literary critic, essayist, translator, and philosopher. He was at times associated with the Frankfurt School of critical theory and was also greatly inspired by the Marxism of Bertolt Brecht and Jewish mysticism as presented by Gershom Scholem.

As a sociological and cultural critic, Benjamin combined ideas drawn from historical materiali...more

More about Walter Benjamin...

Books by Walter Benjamin

The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, and Other Writings on Media

Reflections: Essays, Aphorisms, Autobiographical Writings

One Way Street And Other Writings (The Verso Classics Series)

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Quotes from Illuminationen

“Writers are really people who write books not because they are poor, but because they are dissatisfied with the books which they could buy but do not like.” — 61 people liked it

“How many cities have revealed themselves to me in the marches I undertook in the pursuit of books!” — 35 people liked it

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