La noción de muerte en la estética temprana de Walter Benjamin

Abstract

In this paper we analyse the role played by the notion of death in Walter Benjamin’s early aesthetics, both in connection to the notion of work of art as to the characterization of the activity of criticism. We show that the thematization of death in The Origin of German Tragic Drama, frequently stressed by the academic literature, can be understood as a continuation of the development of “the expressionless” (das Ausdruckslose), present in Goethe’s Elective Affinities. We analyse this concept, which is described as an interruption of vital movement of the work of art, and discuss Winfried Menninghaus’ interpretation that inserts the concept in the tradition of the sublime. We also show the relation of this category to the notion of ruin, to the vindication of allegory and to the theory of art criticism as mortification of the works. Finally, we indicate some resonances of these early theses in Benjamin’s writings of the 30’.