Rescued from incomprehensibility …

… Walter Benjamin, the first pop philosopher. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

… In place of unfathomable reflections on language, he started in 1924 to write about contemporary culture, with an emphasis on its more popular forms. Among other things, he wrote about film, photography, children’s literature, gambling and pornography. These pieces were sent not to academic journals, but to newspapers and general publishers. Beginning in 1927, he started to write and deliver the radio broadcasts collected in Radio Benjamin, many of which were aimed at children. The transformation is extraordinary. Suddenly, his writing becomes engaging, vivid and, above all, understandable. One can’t help feeling the best thing that ever happened to the man was his failure to land a lectureship.