“I’d like to write something that emerges from things the way wine comes from grapes” – this quote by Walter Benjamin reflects the essence of his work. And “A Berlin Childhood” is the masterpiece by this famous author in which he reached what he talked about in that quote. His account of childhood memories in the form of vignettes recalling the images and experiences of the past is a nice piece of literary work. This paper will focus on analyzing the quote by Walter Benjamin in the context of “A Berlin Childhood”, namely to such its vignettes as Loggias and Imperial Panorama (Sleight, 1 – 4).
To begin with, it is necessary to state that Benjamin’s comparison of his work with the grape that transforms into vine can also be applied to the process of human growing up. A child, who is a grape, grows up and becomes a mature vine. This is namely the topic of Benjamin’s memories about his childhood. The author tries to depict his memories as clear and distinct although he has already become a grown-up person. His emotions connected with the images and places of his childhood seem never to fade: “For a long time, life deals with the still-tender memory of childhood like a mother who lays her newborn on her breast without waking it.” (Benjamin, 38).
These lines from the Loggias vignette reflect the tender feelings the author has towards his childhood and everything that surrounded him then. The importance of loggias for him can not be overestimated because time spent there flew away and left only memories after it: “Never did I have the chance to wait for morning on the loggia; every time, it was already waiting for me.” (Benjamin, 41) However, the image of growing up is again associated by the author with grapes and vine, as if demonstrating the determinacy of his allegory in the above presented quote: “I believe that a whiff of this air was still present in the vineyards of Capri where I held my beloved in my arms;..” (Benjamin, 39).
The same can be true about the vignette called “Imperial Panorama” which is describing the place of rest where the author enjoyed being when a child. Again, the allusion to the mature wine emerging from grapes can be applied here as the author understands that his growing up meant that he should forgot the panorama and leave for another generation of youth: “The art forms that survived here all died out with the coming of the twentieth century. At its inception, they found their last audience in children.” (Benjamin, 43 – 44) Nevertheless, the significance of this panorama for the whole further life of the author can not be misunderstood. It says much about the author’s attitude towards it when even such small details are still in his memories: “It was as though I could have heard even wind and church bells if only I had been more attentive.” (Benjamin, 44).
Thus, it can be said know that the statement given as the initial sentence of this paper was successfully put into practice by Walter Benjamin in his “A Berlin Childhood”. He wanted to write something that would “emerge from things the way comes from grapes” and he actually managed to create such a piece of work. His story about the memories he has from his childhood is the reflection of his wish to the person’s growing up and reaching maturity that can be compared to grapes and wine (Sleight, 1 – 4). I am strongly convinced that childhood memories are of crucial importance for every human being because they are connections between the past and the future. And the story by Walter Benjamin proves this statement by its bright example.
Works Cited
Benjamin, Walter. Berlin Childhood around 1900. Belknap Press, 2006.
Sleight, Simon. Benjamin, Walter, Berlin Childhood around 1900, Translated by Howard Eiland. Cambridge, Massachussets and London: Harward University Press, 2006.