Walter Benjamin's Other History: Of Stones, Animals, Human Beings, and Angels
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"Hanssen's exacting, expansive study of the ways Benjamin reconceives history and nature in one another's presence, or distance, is part of the increasing recognition of what it must take intellectually and imaginatively to come to terms with this thinker's soaring innovations."—Stanley Cavell, Harvard University"In this profoundly learned book Hanssen interprets Benjamin's The Origin of German Tragic Drama as the key to understanding his entire corpus. . . . Many books about Benjamin are impenetrable. This one is not." —S. Gittleman, Choice"Beatrice Hanssen has provided an arresting new reading of Benjamin, based on a wide range of materials and a subtle understanding of theoretical issues, both in his time and our own. Her interpretation is informed by contemporary deconstructionist approaches to the fundamental questions raised by Benjamin's texts, which she demonstrates anticipate many of the concerns of Derrida, Levinas and other recent thinkers."—Martin Jay, University of California, Berkeley"Beatrice Hanssen elaborates Benjamin's extremely novel and complex notion of 'history' with unparalleled thoroughness, cogency, and clarity."—Samuel Weber, University of California, Los Angeles
AcknowledgmentsNote on TranslationAbbreviationsIntroduction1Pt. IToward A New Theory of Natural History9Ch. 1Adorno and Benjamin: Against Historicity13Ch. 2The Epistemo-Critical Prologue Reconsidered24Ch. 3The Turn to Natural History49Ch. 4The Aesthetics of Transience66Ch. 5Natural and Sacred History82Pt. IIOf Stones, Animals, Human Beings, and Angels103Ch. 6Limits of Humanity108Ch. 7Benjamin's Unmensch: The Politics of Real Humanism114Ch. 8The Mythical Origins of the Law127Ch. 9Kafka's Animals137Ch. 10The Response to the Kreatur150Postscript163Notes167Bibliography193Index203
