Rescue Narratives: Goethe’s Die Wahlverwandtschaften and Benjamin’s ‘Das Taschentuch’

Abstract

ABSTRACT Walter Benjamin’s little-explored 1932 novella ‘Das Taschentuch’ combines theory and narrative practice. Its reflections on storytelling anticipate the argument of the ‘Erzähler’ essay, while its rescue narrative echoes Benjamin’s essay on ‘Goethes Wahlverwandtschaften’. In ‘Das Taschentuch’ Benjamin adapts Goethe’s novella ‘Die wunderlichen Nachbarskinder’ for his own, technological age, considerably increasing the drama of the original. Like his ‘Goethe’ essay, however, Benjamin’s novella is based on a misreading of Goethe’s text. His biased reading reflects the centrality of rescue, Rettung, in his thought and in particular in his later, historical writings, where rescue takes on both a political and an existential dimension.