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(2018) Tensions in world literature, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan.
Experiments in cultural connectivity
early Twentieth-century German-Jewish thought meets the Daodejing
Peter Fenves
pp. 239-251
Taking its point of departure from a curious remark of Franz Kafka concerning the comparability of the Great Wall of China and the Tower of Babel, Peter Fenves' chapter investigates a series of often-overlooked passages in the work of such exemplary German-Jewish writers as Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig, Walter Benjamin, and Gershom Scholem, in addition to Kafka. The general aim of the chapter consists in sketching a schema of cultural connectivity in which the concept of connection is neither subsumed under the category of cause nor dependent on evidence of reciprocity. The author seeks to show a range of experiments in cultural connectivity, whereby certain Jewish messianic traditions are reflected through the text of the Daodejing and the figure of Laozi.
Publication details
DOI: 10.1007/978-981-13-0635-8_11
Full citation:
Fenves, P. (2018)., Experiments in cultural connectivity: early Twentieth-century German-Jewish thought meets the Daodejing, in W. Fang (ed.), Tensions in world literature, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 239-251.