Berlin Childhood around 1900

This is a new book. Condition: Brand New.

Completed in exile in Paris, as the second World War was dawning, Walter Benjamin looks back at the city of his birth at the beginning of the century. The book is both a sensory memoir of childhood as well as a tour of the iconic spaces of city. These are 'expeditions into the depths of memory', moving through vignettes of domestic settings and classrooms, city squares, parks and streets. The memories of childhood merge with a city that is about to disappear into darkness.

As his friend, Adorno, wrote, the work is 'illuminated by lightning flashes of immediate remembrance . . .the images this book unearths and brings strangely near are not idyllic and not contemplative. Over them lies the shadow of the Third Reich. And through them dreamily runs a shudder at the long forgotten.'

Book details and technical specifications

Format: Hardback
ISBN13: 9781836740148
Published: November 2025

Number of pages: 144
Width: 129 mm
Height: 198 mm
Depth: 13 mm

Publisher: Verso Books