Walter Benjamin: Selected Writings, Volume 2, part 1, 1927-1930 (Walter Benjamin)

In the frenzied final years of the Weimar Republic, amid economic collapse and mounting political catastrophe, Walter Benjamin emerged as the most original practicing literary critic and public intellectual in the German-speaking world. Volume 2 of the __Selected Writings__ is now available in paperback in two parts. In Part 1, Benjamin is represented by two of his greatest literary essays, "Surrealism" and "On the Image of Proust," as well as by a long article on Goethe and a generous selection of his wide-ranging commentary for Weimar Germany's newspapers. Part 2 contains, in addition to the important longer essays, "Franz Kafka," "Karl Kraus," and "The Author as Producer," the extended autobiographical meditation "A Berlin Chronicle," and extended discussions of the history of photography and the social situation of the French writer, previously untranslated shorter pieces on such subjects as language and memory, theological criticism and literary history, astrology and the newspaper, and on such influential figures as Paul Valery, Stefan George, Hitler, and Mickey Mouse. Contents 6 Moscow, 1927 10 Dream Kitsch: Gloss on Surrealism 12 The Political Groupings of Russian Writers 15 On the Present Situation of Russian Film 21 Reply to Oscar A. H. Schmitz 25 Introductory Remarks on a Series for L'Humanite 29 Moscow 31 Review of Gladkov's Cement 56 Journalism 59 Gottfried Keller: In Honor of a Critical Edition of His Works 60 Diary of My Journey to the Loire 71 Review of Soupault's Le coeur d'or 75 The Idea of a Mystery 77 Review of Hessel's Heimliches Berlin 78 A State Monopoly on Pornography 81 Image Imperatives, 1928 84 Curriculum Vitae (III) 86 Andre Gide and Germany: A Conversation with the Writer 89 Main Features of My Second Impression of Hashish: Written January 15, 1928, at 3:30 P.M. 94 Conversation with Andre Gide 100 Old Toys: The Toy Exhibition at the Markisches Museum 107 Hugo von Hofmannsthal's Der Turm 112 Moonlit Nights on the Rue La Boetie 116 Karl Kraus Reads Offenbach 119 The Cultural History of Toys 122 Toys and Play: Marginal Notes on a Monumental Work 126 Everything Is Thought 131 Books by the Mentally Ill: From My Collection 132 Review of the Mendelssohns' Der Mensch in der Handschrift 140 Food Fair: Epilogue to the Berlin Food Exhibition 144 Paris as Goddess: Fantasy on the Latest Novel by Princess Bibesco 150 The Path to Success, in Thirteen Theses 153 Weimar 157 The Fireside Saga 160 News about Flowers 164 Review of Green's Adrienne Mesurat 167 Goethe 170 Karl Kraus (Fragment) 203 The Return of the Flaneur, 1929 206 Chaplin 208 Program for a Proletarian Children's Theater 210 Surrealism: The Last Snapshot of the European Intelligentsia 216 Chaplin in Retrospect 231 Chambermaids' Romances of the Past Century 234 Marseilles 241 On the Image of Proust 246 The Great Art of Making Things Seem Closer Together 257 Milieu Theoreticians 258 Children's Literature 259 Robert Walser 266 The Return of the Flaneur 271 Short Shadows (I) 277 A Communist Pedagogy 282 Notes on a Conversation with Bela Balasz (End of 1929) 285 Some Remarks on Folk Art 287 Tip for Patrons 290 Crisis and Critique, 1930 292 Notes (II) 294 Notes (III) 297 Program for Literary Criticism 298 Notes on a Theory of Gambling 306 The Crisis of the Novel 308 An Outsider Makes His Mark 314 Theories of German Fascism: On the Collection of Essays War and Warriors, edited by Ernst Junger 321 Demonic Berlin 331 Hashish, Beginning of March 1930 336 Julien Green 340 Paris Diary 346 Review of Kracauer's Die Angestellten 364 Food 367 Bert Brecht 374 The First Form of Criticism That Refuses to Judge 381 From the Brecht Commentary 383 Against a Masterpiece 387 Myslovice-Braunschweig-Marseilles: The Story of a Hashish Trance 395 A Critique of the Publishing Industry 403 Graphology Old and New 407 Characterization of the New Generation 410 The Need to Take the Mediating Character of Bourgeois Writing Seriously 412 False Criticism 414 Antitheses 418 A Note on the Texts - Chronology, 1927-1934 - Index 420 A Note on the Texts 422 Chronology, 1927-1934 424 1927 424 1928 428 1929 432 1930 436 1931 441 1932 444 1933 447 1934 452 Notes 457 Index 458