JOURNAL ARTICLE

Innocence: Unschuld.

  • Published In: Diacritics, 2024, v. 52, n. 4. P. 152 1 of 3

  • Database: Academic Search Ultimate 2 of 3

  • Authored By: Law, Christopher; Mitha, Hussein; Proctor, Hannah 3 of 3

Abstract

This co-written essay explores the concept of innocence in "Fate and Character" by Walter Benjamin, as part of a special issue on Benjamin's 1919 essay. We begin with a discussion of Benjamin's later text "Conversation Above the Corso: Recollections of Carnival-Time in Nice" (1935), in which Benjamin remarks that the exaggerated figures at carnival have a relation to innocence, which in turn has a relation to childhood. In "Fate and Character," innocence is harder to pin down: Benjamin writes that it "floats away." Innocence in the essay appears fleetingly, as, we argue, "a gaseous, transitory bi-product of an inquiry that has other ends." For Benjamin, we suggest, innocence is not simply an a priori or natural state, nor is it oppositional to guilt, but something produced through creativity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Additional Information

  • Source:Diacritics. 2024/10, Vol. 52, Issue 4, p152
  • Document Type:Article
  • Subject Area:Literature and Writing
  • Publication Date:2024
  • ISSN:0300-7162
  • DOI:10.1353/dia.2024.a979366
  • Accession Number:191148842
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