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dtpsweeney's review
3.0
Finally read this short, influential work after catching numerous allusions or direct references to Benjamin’s “Angel of History.” Benjamin’s Angel is “propelled into the future to which his back is turned,” and all the while, the catastrophes of history pile and grow larger at his feet with each moment of the present that expires. It’s a striking visual, and an unsentimental metaphoric embodiment of time.
Overall, Benjamin is giving us a critique of the influences of historical materialism. He is skeptical of the certainty and rigidity the view claims right to, and rejects the ideas that progress is a forward march or that power dynamics are fixed and clear. To be clear: Benjamin recognizes the structural nature of oppression. He simply isn’t persuaded that historical materialism, as widely practiced, is flexible or accurate enough to be useful in preparing us to defeat fascism. (This is my understanding and take-away from what I’m reading, but I am open to further elucidation because this text is somewhat out of my wheelhouse.)
The section that resonates most with me as a reader in this time (2020) and place (America) includes these prescient insights:
“The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the ‘state of emergency’ in which we live is not the exception but the rule. We must attain to a conception of history that is in keep- ing with this insight. Then we shall clearly realize that it is our task to bring about a real state of emergency, and this will improve our position in the struggle against Fascism. One reason why Fascism has a chance is that in the name of progress its opponents treat it as a historical norm. The current amazement that the things we are experiencing are ‘still’ possible in the twentieth century is not philosophical. This amazement is not the beginning of knowledge—unless it is the knowledge that the view of history which gives rise to it is untenable.”
Brief, provocative, and lasting. Took me no time at all to finally read it, and I’m glad I did.
Overall, Benjamin is giving us a critique of the influences of historical materialism. He is skeptical of the certainty and rigidity the view claims right to, and rejects the ideas that progress is a forward march or that power dynamics are fixed and clear. To be clear: Benjamin recognizes the structural nature of oppression. He simply isn’t persuaded that historical materialism, as widely practiced, is flexible or accurate enough to be useful in preparing us to defeat fascism. (This is my understanding and take-away from what I’m reading, but I am open to further elucidation because this text is somewhat out of my wheelhouse.)
The section that resonates most with me as a reader in this time (2020) and place (America) includes these prescient insights:
“The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the ‘state of emergency’ in which we live is not the exception but the rule. We must attain to a conception of history that is in keep- ing with this insight. Then we shall clearly realize that it is our task to bring about a real state of emergency, and this will improve our position in the struggle against Fascism. One reason why Fascism has a chance is that in the name of progress its opponents treat it as a historical norm. The current amazement that the things we are experiencing are ‘still’ possible in the twentieth century is not philosophical. This amazement is not the beginning of knowledge—unless it is the knowledge that the view of history which gives rise to it is untenable.”
Brief, provocative, and lasting. Took me no time at all to finally read it, and I’m glad I did.
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