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

Walter Benjamin

Harvard University Press, May 31, 2008 - Art - 426 pages

Walter Benjamin’s famous “Work of Art” essay sets out his boldest thoughts—on media and on culture in general—in their most realized form, while retaining an edge that gets under the skin of everyone who reads it. In this essay the visual arts of the machine age morph into literature and theory and then back again to images, gestures, and thought.

This essay, however, is only the beginning of a vast collection of writings that the editors have assembled to demonstrate what was revolutionary about Benjamin’s explorations on media. Long before Marshall McLuhan, Benjamin saw that the way a bullet rips into its victim is exactly the way a movie or pop song lodges in the soul.

This book contains the second, and most daring, of the four versions of the “Work of Art” essay—the one that addresses the utopian developments of the modern media. The collection tracks Benjamin’s observations on the media as they are revealed in essays on the production and reception of art; on film, radio, and photography; and on the modern transformations of literature and painting. The volume contains some of Benjamin’s best-known work alongside fascinating, little-known essays—some appearing for the first time in English. In the context of his passionate engagement with questions of aesthetics, the scope of Benjamin’s media theory can be fully appreciated.

Contents

• Editors Introduction: 1
• The Production Reproduction and Reception of the Work of: 9
• Second Version: 19
• Theory of Distraction: 56
• To the Planetarium: 58
• Garlanded Entrance: 60
• The Rigorous Study of Art: 67
• Imperial Panorama: 75
• The Telephone: 77
• The Author as Producer: 79
• Paris the Capital of the Nineteenth Century: 96
• Eduard Fuchs Collector and Historian: 116
• Review of Sternbergers Panorama: 158
• Script Image ScriptImage: 167
• Attested Auditor of Books: 171
• These Surfaces for Rent: 173
• The Antinomies of Allegorical Exegesis: 175
• The Ruin: 180
• Dismemberment of Language: 187
• Graphology Old and New: 192
• Painting and Graphics: 195
• Painting and the Graphic Arts: 219
• On Painting or Sign and Mark: 221
• A Glimpse into the World of Childrens Books: 226
• Dream Kitsch: 236
• Moonlit Nights on the Rue La Boétie: 240
• Chambermaids Romances of the Past Century: 243
• Thoughts and Visions of a Severed Head: 249
• Some Remarks on Folk Art: 254
• Chinese Paintings at the Bibliothèque Nationale: 257
• Photography: 263
• News about Flowers: 271
• Little History of Photography: 274
• Painting and Photography: 299
• Review of Freunds Photographie en France au dixneuvième siècle: 312
• Film: 315
• On the Present Situation of Russian Film: 323
• Reply to Oscar A H Schmitz: 328
• Chaplin: 333
• Chaplin in Retrospect: 335
• Mickey Mouse: 338
• The Formula in Which the Dialectical Structure of Film Finds Expression: 340
• The Publishing Industry and Radio: 343
• Journalism: 353
• A Critique of the Publishing Industry: 355
• The Newspaper: 359
• Karl Kraus: 361
• Reflections on Radio: 391
• Theater and Radio: 393
• Conversation with Ernst Schoen: 397
• Fundamental Reflections on a Radio Play: 403
• On the Minute: 407
• Index: 411

About the author

Michael W. Jennings is Class of 1900 Professor of Modern Languages at Princeton University. Brigid Doherty is Associate Professor of German and of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University. Thomas Y. Levin is Associate Professor of German at Princeton University.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility, and Other Writings on Media
• Author: Walter Benjamin
• Editors: Michael W. Jennings, Brigid Doherty, Thomas Y. Levin
• Translated by: E. F. N. Jephcott
• Edition: illustrated
• Publisher: Harvard University Press, 2008
• ISBN: 0674024451, 9780674024458
• Length: 426 pages
• Subjects: Art / Criticism & Theory; Art / General; Art / History / General; Biography & Autobiography / Philosophers; Literary Criticism / European / German; Literary Criticism / Semiotics & Theory; Philosophy / Aesthetics; Philosophy / General; Photography / Subjects & Themes / General; Social Science / Media Studies