Radio Benjamin: Herculaneum and Pompeii

A reading of one of the many stories the German philosopher and cultural critic Walter Benjamin wrote involving catastrophes or natural disasters. Here, you will find first-hand accounts of the ancient volcanic explosion; witness the perfectly preserved remains (petrified unrest) of people living their final moments; hear the poetry written in ash; and see, scrawled on the walls what appeared to be the last words of a civilization. Benjamin reanimates the daily life of these ancient dwellers through a gorgeously considered forensic urbanism, in a radio piece broadcasted in its original in German for children, and here read in English by artist Corey McCorkle. Benjamin was an eclectic thinker, combining elements of German idealism, Romanticism, Western Marxism, and Jewish mysticism, he made enduring and influential contributions to aesthetic theory, literary criticism, and historical materialism. Walter Benjamin’s radio broadcasts (1929 - 1932) were written and read by Benjamin during his colossal research project The Arcades Project, an allegorical look into the birth of modernity in 19th Century Paris. The independent radical publishing house Verso Books has published a nuanced translation of Radio Benjamin, and Clocktower Radio is pleased to present the recorded version of the comprehensive project for the first time in English. Read by New York artist Corey McCorkle, the 29 extant transcriptions will also be annotated with linking principle themes explored in the Arcades Project with the wild variety of subjects Benjamin outlines in these 20 minute stories.

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