This thesis explores the interrelatedness of anarchism and intoxication in Walter Benjamin’s 1929 article, ‘Surrealism: The last snapshot of the European Intelligentsia’. Responding to Marxist understandings of the ‘Surrealism’ article, this thesis contributes to a position put forth by Gershom Scholem regarding Benjamin’s later writings: that anarchism remains a distinct and alternative path in Benjamin’s thought, a path indebted to a youthful engagement with anarchist ideas. Utilising this understanding of anarchism in Benjamin’s later writings, it is argued that a positive understanding of anarchism in Benjamin’s ‘Surrealism’ article is discernible, and it exists in the ambiguous subordination of both anarchism and intoxication before that of Benjamin’s avowedly Marxist position, as expressed in the idea of profane illumination. / It is thus considered how a positive understanding of anarchism and intoxication in Benjamin’s ‘Surrealism’ article is evident not from the perspective of the article’s conclusions, but from the ambiguities of these conclusions. These tensions are further emphasised in focusing upon the temporal discontinuities of Benjamin’s work and the discordant ordering of his writings. Focusing specifically on Benjamin’s childhood remembrances, written after the publication of his ‘Surrealism’ article, it is to be considered how these remembrances, or “images” grant a positive status for Benjamin’s youthful concerns, a point with demonstrable connections to both anarchism and intoxication. These youthful “images” are understood as offering a new trajectory or pathway in readings of Benjamin’s ‘Surrealism’ article, wherein anarchism together with intoxication a represented as an alternative path unbound from their tense subordination beneath Marxism and the profane illumination. In contemplation of this alternative path, concluding remarks engage with the lineaments of a potential “anarchic illumination.” And, as with Benjamin’s “images” of childhood, these potentialities are to be found in those of Benjamin’s earlier writings that profess a sympathetic portrayal of anarchism and intoxication.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/244993 |
| Date | January 2009 |
| Creators | Huba, M. |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | Restricted Access: Abstract and Citation Only Available |
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