One Voice Four Hands:

Walter Benjamin e Asja Lacis

Abstract

The erotic and political encounter of Walter Benjamin and Asja Lacis triggered a decisive change for the first, towards the material philosophy of history. In this meeting, the rudiments of this change are found as a content that permeates other works which contain in themselves some crucial signs to understand them. This is the case of the dedication of One-way Street (Einbahnstrasse) which, beyond a declaration of love, points to the incisive marks left on the body of both, as a temporal split which defines one before and one after in the life and work of Benjamin. We followed the traces of this intertwining in Lacis's theater as in Benjamin's radio experimentation, to understand what awakened in them their childhood (Kindheit): a revolutionary gesture. Finally, we will see in Naples the living image of the interpenetration (Durchdringung) of life (in the city), present in a polyphonic voice written by four hands. The voice incorporated the porosity (Porosität) of Naples in a such way that when describing the perception of the city, it transmits this, so corresponding to its experience (Erfahrung).