{"product_id":"walter-benjamin-and-the-idea-of-natural-history-paperback-softback-9781503637702","title":"Walter Benjamin and the Idea of Natural History (Paperback \/ softback) 9781503637702","description":"\u003cfont face=\"Georgia\"\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"6\"\u003eWalter Benjamin and the Idea of Natural History\u003c\/font\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"4\"\u003eEli Friedlander (Author)\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e9781503637702\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003ePaperback \/ softback, published 16 January 2024\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e350 pages\u003cbr\u003e22.9 x 15.2 x 1.9 cm, 0.498 kg\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\"Friedlander's interpretative lens offers his readers a genuinely illuminating and deeply convincing way of appreciating both the local detail and the overarching significance of Benjamin's texts.\"\u003cbr\u003e  —Stephen Mulhall, University of Oxford \"Friedlander's highly original study resituates the interpretation and evaluation of Benjamin's immensely fecund work within the context of the most advanced contemporary thinking on first and second nature. The book will have a considerable impact across the humanistic disciplines.\"\u003cbr\u003e  —David E. Wellbery, University of Chicago \"Friedlander succeeds beautifully and convincingly in presenting Benjamin's seemingly heterogeneous oeuvre as a coherent philosophical effort. Timely reading for philosophers, Benjamin scholars, and all readers interested in the question of the human as a life-form in trying times.\"\u003cbr\u003e  —Eva Geulen, Leibniz-Zentrum für Literatur- und Kulturforschung \"Friedlander's book resembles a work of origami, comprised of separate pieces folded together to create the illusion of a single, intricate form. And, just as complex origami sometimes requires glue, Friedlander's distinctive readings of Benjamin turn out to be an essential adhesive. In particular, the insights he offers about Benjamin's influences, from Schopenhauer to Goethe, contextualize the philosopher's work as only retrospective critique can do.\"\u003cbr\u003e  —Sarah Moorhouse, \u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e \"[\u003ci\u003eWalter Benjamin and the Idea of Natural History\u003c\/i\u003e] may allow us to reread Benjamin with new clarity and exactness and... displays Friedlander's great attention to detail and rigorous scholarship.\"\u003cbr\u003e  —Michael Villanova, \u003ci\u003eContemporary Political Theory\u003c\/i\u003e \"There has never been any doubt about the brilliance of Benjamin's individual works.... Yet heretofore no one has undertaken to make the corpus cohere. This is Friedlander's task, and the result is revelatory and reinvigorating.... Highly recommended.\"\u003cbr\u003e  —M. Uebel, \u003ci\u003eCHOICE\u003c\/i\u003e \"This book represents an important contribution to the new wave of Benjamin scholarship.... The idea of natural history emerges in Friedlander's treatment as an important theme able to bring together otherwise disparate topics and thereby shed light on their place in Benjamin's thinking.\"—Alison Ross, \u003ci\u003eEuropean Journal of Philosophy\u003c\/i\u003e \"Friedlander's newest book, titled \u003ci\u003eWalter Benjamin and the Idea of Natural History\u003c\/i\u003e, goes to show not only that he is still not convinced Benjamin is not a philosopher, but that he himself has become even more convincing and effective in proving the contrary. Moving further and bolder along the lines drawn in the previous study, in this book he sets upon a reconstruction of a fully-fledged philosophical project that he identifies within the whole body of Benjamin's work.\"—Adam Lipszyc, \u003ci\u003eNew Benjamin Studies\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn this incisive new work, Eli Friedlander demonstrates that Walter Benjamin's entire corpus, from early to late, comprises a rigorous and sustained philosophical questioning of how human beings belong to nature.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAcross seemingly heterogeneous writings, Friedlander argues, Benjamin consistently explores what the natural in the human comes to, that is, how nature is transformed, actualized, redeemed, and overcome in human existence. The book progresses gradually from Benjamin's philosophically fundamental writings on language and nature to his Goethean empiricism, from the presentation of ideas to the primal history of the Paris arcades. Friedlander's careful analysis brings out how the idea of natural history inflects Benjamin's conception of the work of art and its critique, his diagnosis of the mythical violence of the legal order, his account of the body and of action, of material culture and technology, as well as his unique vision of historical materialism.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eFeaturing revelatory new readings of Benjamin's major works that differ, sometimes dramatically, from prevailing interpretations, this book reveals the internal coherence and philosophical force of Benjamin's thought.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003eAcknowledgments\u003cbr\u003e  Introduction: The Natural in the Human\u003cbr\u003e  Part I: Nature in Language\u003cbr\u003e  1. God, Nature, and Man in Language\u003cbr\u003e  2. Naming Beauty\u003cbr\u003e  3. The Life and Afterlife of Words\u003cbr\u003e  4. The Life of Forms\u003cbr\u003e  Part II: Life and Fate\u003cbr\u003e  5. The Guilt and Innocence of Life\u003cbr\u003e  6. Fate, Redemption, and Hope in Love\u003cbr\u003e  7. Myth, Law, and Life in Common\u003cbr\u003e  Part III: Body and Corporeality\u003cbr\u003e  8. The Language of the Body and the Body of Language\u003cbr\u003e  9. Acting Naturally\u003cbr\u003e  Part IV: Primal History\u003cbr\u003e  10. \"\u003cbr\u003eFrom the Pagan Context of Nature into the Jewish Context of History\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  11. Matters of Memory\u003cbr\u003e  12. First and Second Nature in Art\u003cbr\u003e  Part V: The Image of the Contingent\u003cbr\u003e  13. Distorted Life\u003cbr\u003e  Notes\u003cbr\u003e  Bibliography\u003cbr\u003e  Index\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003c\/font\u003e","brand":"Stanford University Press","offers":[{"title":"Brand New","offer_id":52653203357976,"sku":"9781503637702","price":21.85,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/freshlyprintedbooks.co.uk\/products\/walter-benjamin-and-the-idea-of-natural-history-paperback-softback-9781503637702","provider":"Freshly Printed Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}