The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

Content Warning: This section references Fascist violence and death by suicide.

Walter Benjamin was a philosopher, cultural analyst, and historical theorist. He wrote in German and French about the relationship between society, cultural products (like film, plays, and photography), history, and politics. Much of his work has been translated into English and other languages. His best-known essays, in addition to “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” are “The Task of the Translator,” about the difficulty of translating a text, and “On the Concept of History,” about how to write anti-Fascist history. His most widely read books in contemporary times are his doctoral thesis, The Origin of German Tragic Drama, and The Arcades Project, an unfinished magnum opus about the covered passages of Paris and the rise of modern European urbanism.

Benjamin was born in Berlin in 1892 to a secular Jewish family. In his adult years, he spent time both in Germany and Paris. In the lead up to the Nazis taking power in Germany, Benjamin left Germany permanently and lived as a refugee in France. In 1935, when “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” was written, he was living with very modest means in Paris, reflecting on the rise of Fascist politics which had made his life so precarious.