Cartography of thinking - Kafka and Benjamin in the context of Judaism and modernity (Franz Kafka, Walter Benjamin)

Franz Kafka and Walter Benjamin did not participate publicly in the controversial discussions on Jewsh identity and the place of Jews in German literature which took place for instance in 1912 in the wake of Moritz Goldstein's article,"Deutsch-Judischer Parnass" (German-Jewish Parnassus). But they thought intensively about the question raised in these discussions and took them to the level of fundamental reflexions on the relationship between Judaism, Germanness, modernism and literature. This article attempts to construct a cartography of the thinking of the two writers on these inter-related themes. It is thus intended as a contribution to the "other" Jewish history in Germany,,Which does not really fit into the picture of an understanding of history that is determined by the co-ordinates assimilation and emancipation, Anti-Semitism and contributions' to German culture" (Michael Brenner).