Called ��he most important critic of his time��by Hannah Arendt, Walter Benjamin has only become more influential over the years, as his work has assumed a crucial place in current debates
over the interactions of art, culture, and meaning. A ��atural and extraordinary talent for letter writing was one of the most captivating facets of his nature,��writes Gershom Scholem in
his Foreword to this volume; and Benjamin's correspondence reveals the evolution of some of his most powerful ideas, while also offering an intimate picture of Benjamin himself and the
times in which he lived.
Writing at length to Scholem and Theodor Adorno, and exchanging letters with Rainer Maria Rilke, Hannah Arendt, Max Brod, and Bertolt Brecht, Benjamin elaborates on his ideas about metaphor
and language. He reflects on literary figures from Kafka to Karl Kraus, and expounds his personal attitudes toward such subjects as Marxism and French national character. Providing an
indispensable tool for any scholar wrestling with Benjamin�� work, The Correspondence of Walter Benjamin, 1910��940 is a revelatory look at the man behind much of the twentieth
century�� most significant criticism.
