Quotes from Walter Benjamin are a substitute for actual content

[sabotabby]

Here you have the catchword around which has long circled a debate familiar to you. Its familiarity tells you how unfruitful it has been, for it has not advanced beyond the monotonous reiteration of arguments for and against: on the one hand, the correct political line is demanded of the poet; on the other, one is justified in expecting his work to have quality. Such a formulation is of course unsatisfactory as long as the connection between the two factors, political line and quality, has not been perceived. Of course, the connection can be asserted dogmatically. You can declare: a work that shows the correct political tendency need show no other quality. You can also declare: a work that exhibits the correct tendency must of necessity have every other quality.

This second formulation is not uninteresting, and, moreover, it is correct. I adopt it as my own. But in doing so I abstain from asserting it dogmatically. It must be proved.

(Bad political folksingers, I'm looking at you.)

I was wondering today what Benjamin's and Brecht's friendship must have been like. It's not that I imagine Brecht as more of a hardass (though he probably was), but there's a certain touching optimism that I see in Benjamin's work that makes me think that he must have argued a lot with the sort of personality who wrote something like "What Keeps Mankind Alive?" I really wish I had a time machine, though it probably still wouldn't help as I don't speak German.

Also, Benjamin's adorable fanboying writing about Karl Kraus makes me now want to read Karl Kraus. Have any of you read him?

Comments

[shelestel.livejournal.com]

*Sigh* And what was his proof, so that we can decons argue with it?

[sabotabby]

If I understand him correctly, if it isn't good, it doesn't really have the correct political line.

[shelestel.livejournal.com]

Haha. What a talented (and naive?) use of logic! The formulation you quote in the text though has given rise to many idiotic an interpretation, while "if it isn't good art then it isn't the right politics" sounds much better.
Probably has to do with how we perceive politicians (dirty) vs. how we perceive the art world (sublime).

[sabotabby]

Maybe. Having thought about it I'm not entirely sure I agree (and I definitely don't agree that the inverse is true—there's plenty of good art with godawful politics); but I sort of want to.

[jk-fabiani.livejournal.com]

I have to write a chorus
and sing it
like clockwork
power to the people!

[sabotabby]

Is that an actual song? If not, it should be.

[culpster.livejournal.com]

cf: "Brecht In Exile" by Bruce Cook. I think I purged my copy in a neurotic fit, but it has some material on Brecht and Benjamin's relationship I believe.

Also asks the musical question which also occupies Williams: how does Life of Galileo end up being both his best work (by their estimation), and the least 'rigorous' by Brecht's rhetorical standards?

I'm no Brecht scholar, but I agree with the old fogeys that "Food is the first thing/morals follow on" is a conception that it is quite possible to dissent from :)

I assume you know/own the Tom Waits version? It's on the "Lost In the Stars" comp.

[culpster.livejournal.com]

PS - Apparently Weill couldn't stand the guy.

[sabotabby]

I'm no Brecht scholar, but I agree with the old fogeys that "Food is the first thing/morals follow on" is a conception that it is quite possible to dissent from :)

Sure, but I have to admire the utter bleakness of that play. Speaking of bleak, have you read/seen The Measures Taken? I need to but I can't seem to find it anywhere.

I assume you know/own the Tom Waits version? It's on the "Lost In the Stars" comp.

Ooooh, yes.

PS - Apparently Weill couldn't stand the guy.

Okay, now I'm imagining Brecht and Benjamin defending their friendship to Weill and Adorno, respectively.

[culpster.livejournal.com]

No intelligence re The Measures Taken.

And now I must ask: precisely WHICH footsoldier from the army of insipid activist folkies are you sniping at? ;)

[sabotabby]

It was more of a general comment. Do I hafta pick just one?

[culpster.livejournal.com]

It just sounded like you were running screaming from one in that moment.

Let "god" sort em out.

[faithhopetricks.livejournal.com]

Still totally best dead depresso East European philosopher boyfriend ever.

[sabotabby]

Indeed. I may need a "dead German boyfriends" tag.

[rohmie.livejournal.com]

Cute With Chris is live in Toronto tonight. (I just found out myself.)

He's also reading stories this Sunday, Nov 2nd at 2:00 PM.

[sabotabby]

Sigh, it's a school night. Sunday's a vague possibility, but probably not, as I have a crazy amount of things happening this weekend.

[seanmonster.livejournal.com]

Did somebody say political folksingers?

[sabotabby]

No, that would be good political folksinging.

[dobrovolets.livejournal.com]

I don't think Brecht and Benjamin would argue so much as Benjamin would say something silly, and Brecht would sneer. (I guess you can tell where I would tend to fall.)

Kraus was a good aphorist, though very culturally specific. Attempts to translate his work from German have been sporadic, and failures.

[sabotabby]

I don't think Brecht and Benjamin would argue so much as Benjamin would say something silly, and Brecht would sneer. (I guess you can tell where I would tend to fall.)

Aww. Though that would be good too.

Kraus was a good aphorist, though very culturally specific. Attempts to translate his work from German have been sporadic, and failures.

The bits that Benjamin quotes are lovely, though I have a sneaking suspicion that they're probably among the less culturally specific parts. I figured that I was unlikely to find much in translation. Woe.

[rrrao.livejournal.com]

Gahh... I took a grad seminar on Benjamin, but it has left me precious little off the top of my head to contribute in the way of casting some speculative light on what their relationship would've been like, apart from stuff you probably already know - Adorno didn't like Brecht's coarse Marxism, and worried that it would dull Benjamin's delicate and refined, rarified theoretical musings.

I remember reading that Benjamin stayed in a little guesthouse or room at Brecht's place in Denmark (I suppose sometime in the early 30s, in exile from the Nazis), and they would drink red wine and have animated conversations and get on fabulously. I suppose that was what Adorno was jealous of, but he was a dour, sour old man...

[sabotabby]

I'm jealous. Well, perhaps jealous is the wrong term. I'm not sure that our age has the sort of minds that theirs did. I wouldn't have wanted to live back then (I mean, look how Benjamin died) but I really wish I'd been in on their discussions.