Walter Benjamin and Bertolt Brecht: Story of a Friendship?
A one-day conference
10am–c. 8pm, 6 November 2009
Birkbeck, Malet Street, Bloomsbury London WC1E 7HX
(Rooms B36/B02& B03)
The English translation of Erdmut Wizisla’s formidable study Walter
Benjamin and Bertolt Brecht: The Story of a Friendship was published
this Autumn by Libris. No one has a better view of the much disputed
relationship between these two Wgures than Erdmut Wizisla, director of
Berlin’s Benjamin and Brecht Archives. Greeting the German edition,
Momme Brodersen, Benjamin’s biographer, spoke for many when he wrote:
‘If this book had appeared decades ago, it would have terminated an
unproductive debate in one fell swoop: that of the influence – be it
fruitful, be it disastrous – of probably the most significant German
playwright and poet of the 20th century, Bertolt Brecht, on probably the
most significant critic of his day, Walter Benjamin’. Our conference
celebrates the book’s publication and explores the ways in which
Wizisla’s study augments, challenges or re-constellates previous
analyses (most notably the one emanating from that other Story of a
Friendship, published in English in 1982, by Gershom Scholem).
The conference is free, but please register beforehand by email to Julia
Eisner, [log in to unmask]
Any queries may be directed to Esther Leslie, [log in to unmask]
Conference Programme
10am–5pm
Room B36, basement, Birkbeck, Main Building
Papers are c.20 minutes long and are followed by discussion
10.00am Registration
10.20 Opening words
10.30 Peter Thompson (Sheffield): Brecht, Benjamin and the Crisis of
Modernity
11.10 Chryssoula Kambas (Osnabrück): From West to East: An External
Examiner Remembers
11.50 Break
12.10pm Barbara Engh (Leeds): Friendship and Clang Figures
1.00 Lunch break
2.30 Erdmut Wizisla (Berlin): The Benjamin Archive and the New German
Benjamin Edition
3.10 Tony Phelan (Oxford): Brecht on Benjamin – ‘On the Philosophy of
History’
3.50 Break
4.10 Summing up - Esther Leslie: Constellations and Comradeship
5.00 Conference closes
Launch 5.30–c. 8pm
Rooms B02 & B03
Erdmut Wizisla,
Walter Benjamin and Bertolt Brecht – the Story of a Friendship,
Libris, London 2009
‘Wizisla’s brilliant study of the complex and controversial intellectual
relationship between Walter Benjamin and Bertolt Brecht will be the
standard work on this subject for years to come. It blows away the dusty
cliches that have so far passed for scholarship in this area, thanks to
Wizisla’s unsurpassed knowledge of previously unpublished documents and
archive materials, which enables him to reconstruct and reconsider every
dimension of Brecht and Benjamin’s relationship from 1929 to 1940.
Lucidly and accessibly written, this book is essential reading not only
for Brecht and Benjamin specialists, but for all those interested in
this crucial phase of twentieth century cultural history.’
Steve Giles, Emeritus Professor of German Studies and Critical Theory,
University of Nottingham.
5.30pm Welcome and wine
5.40 Words of memory and thanks – Nick Jacobs
5.45 Introduction – Tom Kuhn
6.00 Erdmut Wizisla – ‘My First Acquaintance with Brecht and Benjamin’
Thereafter wine and snacks
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