2021-03-20
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All one word.
So Walter Benjamin is notorious for being one of the most elusive thinkers of the early 20th century.
His work is a combination of influences so varied, it's almost funny.
It's a mix of ideas so seemingly disconnected,
the act of connecting them is almost as impressive as the ideas themselves.
He'll go from Kant, then over to Marx,
then back to 19th century German literary criticism, then over to Jewish mysticism.
He'll go all over the world.
And needless to say what results from all this is a very interesting critique of 20th century culture.
The man's work is often referred to as difficult.
Sometimes people go so far as to say it's downright incomprehensible.
This is no doubt part of the reason why there's such a lack of representation of his work in the world,
which is part of the reason why I wanted to cover him here today.
Sometimes when reading Ben Amin,
he can say things that on the surface seem to be completely irrational or completely counterintuitive.
But I think the biggest barrier in trying to understand what he's saying is,