Berlin som mnemotekniskt hjälpmedel

Walter Benjamin om Franz Hessel

Abstract

Berlin as Mnemonic Device: Walter Benjamin on Franz Hessel

In reviewing a work by Franz Hessel, Walter Benjamin speaks of Berlin as a mnemonic device for the lonely wanderer. This article unpacks this peculiar claim by arguing that Benjamin maps ars memoria, a technique for memorization in rhetoric, onto the modern cityscape. According to the particular art of memory to which Benjamin refers, emblems placed in an imagined series of rooms signify consecutive parts of a speech to be  remembered. The mnemonic technique thus allows the trained orator to trace a narrative sequence through interconnected spaces that encase a chain of images. By referring to the city as a mnemonic device, Benjamin indicates how the topography and visual character of the urban space may serve as a repository for narratives that circulate across city-dwelling generations. The Berlin flâneur thus uses movement through the city to release its deposited past. In Benjamin’s article, the lonely wanderer finally emerges as part shaman and part tourist guide.