Cemeteries of Tradition: The Critique of Collection in Heine, Nietzsche, and Benjamin

Author(s): Caroline Newman

Source: Pacific Coast Philology, Vol. 19, No. 1/2 (Nov., 1984), pp. 12-21
Published by: Penn State University Press on behalf of the Pacific Ancient and Modern Language
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CEMETERIES OF TRADITION:
THE CRITIQUE OF COLLECTION IN
HEINE, NIETZSCHE, AND BENJAMIN
Caroline Newman
The mentionof corpses,cemeteries,and mausoleumsin the briefdescriptionof
my talk may have led some of you to expecta ratherghoulishpresentation.'Yet
while Heine, Nietzsche,and Benjamindo have some seriousthingsto say about
the "ghosts"oftradition,it is notas iftheydidn'tknowhow to tella good "ghost"
story.The identityof the ghost,forone, is hard to pin down: is it we who haunt
the past or the past thathauntsus? Should we view ourselves,as the tiredcliche
of the bookwormimpliesas parasiteson the past? Perhaps thereis a bit of the
necrophiliacin any studentof historicaltexts,yetit is not immediatelyclear that
we, like the potato-plantinggrave-diggerin the cemeteryof Flaubert's Madame
Bovary,
quite literally"feedupon thedead."
Still in tracingthesethreewriters'concernwithan art and a historythathave
become "collectible"- withthecollectionsof the museumand thatother"collecand the
tion" knownas literaryhistory- thereis a sense in whichthe figurative
literalwill seriouslycome intoplay. Briefly,what startsout in Heine as a merely
figurative
comparisonbetweenan art thatcollectsand an art thatis institutionally
collected,willemergein Nietzscheand Benjaminas an explicitcritiqueofcollecting
institutions.
Or to put thisin termsmoresuitableto a discussionofdead and living
bodies of tradition:whereasHeine exposes the collectedcontentsof a canonized
corpusas so manycorpses,Nietzscheand Benjaminbeginto ask how thecollection
ofa corpusmayitselfdeterminea corpse-likecontent.It is importantat theoutset
to notethisshiftin emphasisfromthecontentsofcollectionto thecollectingcontainers themselves.For ifwhat I have to say about theircommonsuspicionofa "dead"
historydisconnectedfrompresentneedsis valid,itfollowsthatthesethreecritiques,
writtenroughlyfifty
years apart, should be acutelyhistoricalin character.In a
ofhistory"
largersense,however,all threewritersargue againstthe "containment
in collectionin a remarkablysimilarway. Believingthatthevalue ofpast artifacts
mustbe criticallydeterminedbyandforthepresent,each insistson confronting
the
timelesswiththetimely,thedead timeofcollectionwiththatothertimeofcontemporaryhistoricalpossibility.
This is certainly
thecase forHeine,who,afteryearsofstyling
himself
as Germany's
turned
to
the
timeliness
of
satire
social
foremost
and
criticism,
lyricpoet,
increasingly
and hisjournalisticwritingsfromParis. Indeed thedifference
bothin theReisebilder
betweendead collectionand presenthistoricalpossibility- forHeine the history

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ofTradition
Cemeteries

13

being enacted in France but not in Germany- is the subjectof one of his first
journalisticpieces. In his reviewoftheSalon of 1831he implicitly
arguesfora new
"content"of collectionby ignoringthe permanentworksin the Louvre to discuss
the Frenchpaintingstemporarily
mountedin frontof the Old Masters. Because
artistslike Delacroix had tradedmedievaland classical allusionsforreferences
to
contemporaryhistory- in particularto the eventsof 1830 - Heine founda
revolutionhere comparableto the one he soughtto bringabout in bothGermany
and itsliterature.
Heine closesthisreviewofa contemporary
collection
Significantly,
by announcingthe death of artisticworks that only collect the past: "My old
whichbegan at Geothe'scradle
prophecy,"he writes,"oftheend oftheKunstperiode,
and will end at his coffin,
appears here to be nearingits fulfillment."2
Heine justifiablyspeaks of an old prophecyas his 1828 reviewof Menzel's Die
deutsche
Literatur
had firstidentified
an epoch which"began withtheappearanceof
Goetheand now drawsto a close" to insistthatthe "principleoftheage ofGoethe,
theart idea, is disappearing."3We can be morepreciseabout this"principle"and
its relationto a problematiccontentof collection,however,ifwe turnto Heine's
own literaryhistory,TheRomantic
School,publishedin 1835. Writtenas a kindof
is
"ghost story,"this centraltextin Heine's ongoingfarewellto the Kunstperiode
designedto buryan art and a literaryhistorythatcollectthe past at the expense
of revolutionary
actionin the present.
The "ghoststory"comes to a climaxin a lengthysatireon Germanand French
spiritstowardsthe end of thework.Heine firstrecallsthedrearyband ofGerman
ghostswho followedhimall theway to theFrenchborderonlyto "fleeat thesight
of thethree-colored
flag."Since Frenchghosts,by contrastare primarilyrevolutionary"spirits,"Heine wondersiftheycan be deemedlegitimatephantomsat all; if
therewere such a thingas Frenchghosts,he concludes,theywould immediately
throwa ghostparty,open a ghostcoffeehouse, and set up a ghostnewspaper.4
Schoolany pretenseof orthodoxliterary
Obviously by this point in TheRomantic
has
been
abandoned.
from
the veryfirstpages, however,Heine
history
Already
conceiveshis evaluationof theage ofGoethe,Schiller,and theSchlegelsas a kind
of polemicalobituary;he likensliteraryhistory,forinstance,"to a greatmorgue
where everyoneseeks his dead, the ones he loves or his relations."5But as the
purposeofthisparticularvisitto themorgueis less to claim thanto burythedead,
Heine hardlyhas timeto stop fora fleetingkisson the "pallid lips of Lessingand
Herder." There are otherghoststhatneed exorcising,othercorpsesin the corpus
inhibitingHeine's desire forboth a revolutionin politicsand a Saint-Simonian
"rehabilitationof the flesh.""6
Chiefamong these are the Romanticswhom Heine
portraysas dreamyloversof the past, collectorsofearlyGermanartworksand of
folkand fairytales. The ghost attendingthis corpse is primarilyantiquarianin
character,forin Heine's view, the Romantics'devotionto the "holyrelics"ofthe
Middle Ages entaileda collectionofthe past forthe past's sake alone.' Of course,
Goetheand Schillerpartiallyrepresent
a countertothismedievalism,
butclassicism,
Heine argues,had also forsakenthe presentforan idealized past. In comparing
Goethe's worksfirstto "lifelessstatues that decorate a garden," then to actual
statuesin the Louvre,Heine's pointis to suggestthatsuch monumental"hybrids
ofgodlinessand stone"could no longerserveas modelsforthe present."

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CarolineNewman

14

Of course the youngerHeine was enoughof a romanticdreamerand Hellenist

of
thatthe spiritshe takeson hereare partlyold ghostsofhimself.In theHarzreise
1824, for instance,Heine recounteda dream in which the "lifelessstatues" of
libraryfullof
antiquitywere stillverymuch alive to him. Fleeing froma stuffy
disputingacademics into an imaginaryhall of antiquities,the poet-dreamerof a
and "Greekcalm" at thefeetofa statue
decade earlierfound"sweetforgetfullness"
ofthe Medici Venus.9By thetimeof TheRomantic
School,however,Heine no longer
subscribesto thenotionofa "timelessworldofart"or to theKunstperiode's
particular
to revivethe monumentsof an ideal past. For Heine, writingin the 1830s,
effort
could not be answeredby mereappeals to the
the questionof politicalunification
culturalunityof Germany- whetherin the formof the Romantics'"aesthetic
between
church"or Schiller's"aestheticstate."Thus evenas he notesthedifferences
the medieval or antique contentsof two kinds of collection,Heine is primarily
commonpromotionof art as a "second,
concernedto expose the Kunstperiode's
concerns.'0Interestingly
from
world"
severed
enough,
contemporary
independent
in theafterword
of 1851,thisattackon Kantian "disinterestedness"
to theRomanzero
in favoroftheinterestofthepresent,is articulatedin termsofyetanotherencounter
with an antique statue- this timewith the real Venus de Milo in the Louvre
ratherthan with a dreamed Medici Venus. This stonygoddess, much like the
"lifelessstatues"firstinvokedin the critiqueof Goethe's "indifferent"
classicism,
has no consolationto offer;hereshe onlyadmonishes:"Don't you see that I can't
help you since I have no arms?""
Much as all thishelps explain Heine's refusalof an art thatcollectsthe past to
the detriment
of thepresent,at the same timeit revealssome of the limitationsof
Heine's analysis.For althoughthedeathsofHegel,Goethe,and Humboldtbetween
1831 and 1835 seemed to offerthe proofof Heine's prophecy,in manyways the
the beginningof its institutional
end of the "art period" was more importantly
collection.Given Heine's rejectionof the notionof art as a "second,independent
of
world,"it seems strikingthat the museum- the architecturalrepresentation
just such a separatesphere- should figureonlyas a backdropin his critiqueof
the contentsof collection.The neo-classicalfacades of Schinkel'sBerlinmuseum
in Munich (bothcompletedin theearly 1830s) did more
or ofKlenze's Glyptothek
thanhouse thekindofstatuesHeine comparedwithGeothe'sworks;theyliterally
embodiedthatideal ofa "templeofart" whichtheRomantics,Tieck and Wackenroder,as well as Winckelmann,Goethe, and Humboldthad firstassociatedwith
the idea of the museumsome thirtyyearsearlier.In thisrespect,Heine's attempt
to burythe "dead phantomoftheold art"'2is perhapshauntedby a phantomthat
he neverfullymeets.Thus whenHeine claimsat theend of TheRomantic
Schoolthat
the presentlooksintothe "gravesofthepast ... at theend ofa period,or shortly
beforea catastrophe,"'3
it recallshis oldprophecywhileremindingus thatthistrip
to the morguewas onlya temporary
farewellto theKunstperiode.
FromtheperspectiveofNietzsche,writingin the 1870s,Heine's apocalyptichope
fora new age was achieved only at the price of the institutionalization
of "catasoftheGermanstate.14For theunification
trophe,"in theformof theestablishment
of GermanywhichHeine hoped to see accomplishedby revolution,
had firstfailed
to materializein the parliamentary
of 1848,onlyfinallyto be achievedby
reforms

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Cemeteries
ofTradition

15

militarymight.Ironically,Heine's earlierinsistenceon an art in serviceofpolitics,

an insistencebased on his experiencesin France,seemedhereto turnon itself;now
a new stateundertheauspicesofBismarckwas appropriating
theGermancultural
traditionas a guaranteeofits politicalsuperiority
over France. It is worthwhile
to
recall thatit was duringthistimethatSchillerand Goethewerefirstenshrinedas
the "classic" German writers:on one hand, afterthe terminationof exclusive
fromnew editionsof theircollected
copyrighta publishingindustrywas profiting
which werejust beginningto establishthe
works;on the other,the universities,
endowedchairsin Goetheand Schiller's
special fieldofmodernGermanliterature,
name. Finally,the statuesof the museumand the authorsof the Kunstperiode
that
Heine had once compared,literallycame togetheron a singlepedestalin the new
craze in the 1870sand 1880sformonumentsto Germany'snationalpoets.'5In his
firstUntimely
Nietzschesatirizedthisculturalnarcissismby assuming
Meditation,
thevoice of a nationalisticBildungsphilister:
"We have afterall our culturesincewe
have our Classics."''6Alreadyat theverybeginningof thiscritiqueof the "classic"
author David Strauss - writtenjust two years afterGermany'svictoryin the
Franco-Prussianwar - Nietzschewarnedagainst the Prussianhabit of equating
he charged,mightmean the"extirmilitarywithculturalachievement.The former,
pation" of the latter."
Yet despitethesemajorpoliticaland culturalchanges,Nietzsche'ssecondUntimely
"On theUse and Abuse ofHistory,"oftenseemsto echo Heine's earlier
Meditation,
School.
polemicin TheRomantic
ConsideringthatNietzsche'scritiqueofhistoriography
includes contemporaryliteraryhistory,there are strikingsimilaritiesbetween
Heine's appraisal of an art thatcollectshistoryand Nietzsche'sevaluationof the
historiesthatcollectart. The "lifelessstatues"of classicismare stillweighingon
the present,forinstance,accordingto Nietzsche'sassessmentof the dangersof
monumentalhistoriography.
In resignedflightfromthepresent,themonumentalist
seeksto lose himselfin an ideal worldofthecanonicand theclassic.As ifhis motto
were "let the dead burythe living,"he erectsa "templeof history"forreverent
could be said to haunt
contemplation.'8
Similarlytheghostsofromantichistoricism
Nietzsche'ssecond typeof historian,the antiquarianwho succumbsto a "blind
passionforcollecting."By valuingtheold simplybecause itis old - indeedassuming, Nietzschewrites,that the old is by virtueof that fact "immortal"- this
collector'spious conservationof the bygonethreatensto mummify
the presentas
well."9Finally,Nietzsche'sportrayalofthecriticalhistoriancould be takenas a fair
to burya dead past; in puttinghistoryon trial,
descriptionofHeine's earliereffort
thishistoriographer
not onlyjudges but seeks to destroythe past, ifnecessary.Of
thethreetypesofhistorians,thecriticalone alone has theinstinctto forgetthepast
forthe sake of the present.20
Yet "forgetfullness"
in Nietzsche'svocabularyhas both positiveand negative
connotations:itis oftennecessarythatforgetfulness
itselfbe forgotten.
Here,I think,
we can begin to measurethe differences
betweenHeine's critiqueof the contents
of collectionand Nietzsche'smoredialecticalattackon collectioninstitutions.
For
whileNietzsche'scritiquealso seeksto supplantthehypertrophy
ofhistorywithan
- as Heine did
active concernforpresenthistoricalpossibility,he distinguishes
not- betweentheusesandabusesofhistory.One ofthoseuses is mentionedalready

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16

CarolineNewman

Meditation:
"It is onlyinsofaras I am a
ot the second Untimely
in the introduction
of
older
of
Greek
that
I come - as a child of the
times,especially
times,
pupil
present -

to such untimely thoughts . . . I can't imagine what purpose classical

- thatis, to
philologyshould have in our time,ifnot to have an untimelyeffect
workagainstthe times,and thusaffectthe times,hopefullyin the interestoftimes
to come."2'
It is not,however,as ifNietzschehereopposes the timelessnessofGreekideals
to the barbarismofa presentage. He too suspectsthatstatuesof"beautifulsouls"
withtheir"noble simplicity
and quiet grandeur"could onlybe stonycorpsesto us.
But ifthe Venus de Milo can no longerhelp, in Nietzsche'sview it is less by dint
of some historicalfracture- what Heine calls her loss of arms - than because
that perfecttotalitywas fromthe beginninga mythicfiction,one that servedto
hide, under the mask of the timelessor the Apollonian,a fracturewithinGreek
historyitself. Nietzsche later writes in Twilightof the Idols that it was the
"psychologist"in him thatsaved himfromrehearsing"the Germanfoolishnessof
the beautifulGreeksoul."22In EcceHomohe specifiesthe genealogicaltask of the
morefullyas the "transvaluationof all values."23
psychologist
This briefsummary,I realize,goes againstthe commondivisionof Nietzsche's
workinto threeperiods,and moreparticularlyagainstthe view thatthe Untimely
Meditations
belong to Nietzsche'searly and relatively"uncritical"work. Perhaps
thismightbe said ofthethirdand fourthmeditations
whichcelebrateSchopenhauer
and Wagnerin a way thatthe laterNietzschesaw fitto retract.But to the extent
that "on the Use and Abuse of History"insists,as Nietzschewriters:first,"that
theoriginofhistoricalstudymustitselfbe viewedhistorically";
second,"thathistory
itselfmust solve the problemof history";and finally,"that historicalknowledge
mustturnits thornagainstitself,"24
his analysisalreadyimpliesthattherecan be
no eternaltruthssomehow"outside" of history,thatwhat we call truthis in fact
the historyof thiserror.
Thus ifNietzscheagreeswithHeine thathistoryis now "so guardedthatityields
his untimelycritiquemustbe forus farmore
onlyhistoriesand no real history,"25
timely:it re-stagesthe rejectionof the corpsesof traditionin the formof a more
criticalquestionconcerningthecollectionsthatmay turnthecorpusintoa corpse.
Here it is not so muchthecontentsofculturalexhibitionas theway in whichthey
are exhibitedwhichthreatensto petrify
tradition.Nietzschearguesthatthepseudoobjectivitiesof both the monumentalistand the antiquarian- the former'sahistoricalvenerationforeternaltruthsand the latter'sequally a-historicalappeal
to absolute facts- workto interhistoryas the mummyof continuoustradition.
"History,"Nietzscheremarks,"is now put on displaylikepicturesin a gallery,"''26
forcontemplation
only.Nor is thedangerofsuch exhibitionlimitedto thepassive
"whenlarge
contemplationit imposesupon its spectators.For historyitselfsuffers
.. and onlyisolated,embellishedfacts,likeislands,standout."27
partsare forgotten.
Here again thedead bodyoftraditionresultsfromtoo little,nottoo muchhistory,
Ironically,thisuntimelymeditationurgesa timely,not a timelessencounterwith
history.As Nietzschewill later writein The GayScience,"perhapsthe past is still
largely undiscovered."28

Benjamin's writingsof the 1930s have an obvious stake in the "undiscovered

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Cemeteries
ofTradition

17

past"; indeed in Benjamin'sview, any historythatis not recognizedas an urgent

concernofthepresentthreatensto be envelopedin a blankhomogeneity,
the"once
thismummification
of the past, much
upon a time"of dead history.Significantly,
as in Heine and Nietzsche'scritiques,is attributedto the"still-lifes"
ofmonumental
and antiquariancollection.And even more explicitlythan Nietzsche,Benjamin
linksthe dead museumof culturalhistoryto its institutional
setting,be it public
museumcollectionor the "collections"of academic literaryhistory.Because such
institutionspromotea definitionof officialculturehostile to the culturalitself,
Benjamin seeks to counterthe immobilizationof collectionwiththe strategiesof
the mobilecollector.In manyways thisnew collectorresemblesBenjamin'snotion
of the "destructivecharacter"whose historicalrole in the 1930sis not so much to
preservetheculturalas to breakdownculturalpreserves,in particularthe "official
culture"of Fascism. Like the "destructivecharacter,"thiscollectordoes not seek
to "pass down thingsto posterity
by makingthemuntouchableand thusconserving
them"; ratherhe "passes on situationsby puttingthem into practiceand thus
liquidatingthem."29In Benjamin'sview, as we shall see, the corpse can only be
revivedifit is freedfromthe petrification
ofa fixedaestheticcorpus.
Of course one way to change the institutionof collection,as we know already
fromHeine, is to change its contents.Benjamin admiresthe nineteenth-century
collectorEdward Fuchs preciselybecause he (muchlike theHeine who tradedOld
Mastersfornew salon paintingsin theLouvre) ignoredthecelebratedworksofthe
museumto collectthecaricaturesofDaumier. Fuchs himselfhad complainedthat
the collectionsto be seen in the museumsofWilhelminianGermany"give us only
very incompleteideas about the cultureof the past."30 In the "Theses on the
PhilosophyofHistory,"Benjaminspecifieswhatthedangersofsuchan institutional
historymightbe, namelya history"ofthevictors"only.Arguingthatthereis "no
culturaldocumentwhichis notat thesame timea documentofbarbarism,"Benjamin
equates culturaltreasureswiththe bootycarriedoffin thevictor'striumphalprocession."3
Perhaps the most serious task of the collector,however,is to "wresttradition
fromthe conformism
whichis about to overwhelmit," to "explode,"as Benjamin
writesin anotherofthe"Theses," "thecontinuumofhistory.""32
This projectinvolves
a rejectionof the same contemplativeattitudeNietzschealigned with the false
ofantiquariancollection.In the"Theses" Benjaminattacksthehistoricist
objectivity
who seeks the "eternalimage of the past," the historicist
who tellsthesequenceof
events "like the beads of a rosary.""33
By contrast,the historicalmaterialist,as
Benjamin insistsboth here and in the essay on Fuchs, forgoesthe contemplative
habitofcollecting"eternalimages"toaccountforthepresent'sparticularexperience
ofa particularpast.
In the essay on "LiteraryHistoryand LiteraryScholarship,"a similarcritique
of historicistcollectionmotivatesBenjamin's impatiencewith academic literary
in particularwiththeBiedermeir"collectingand cherishing"ofpositivistic
history,
Yet the mostinteresting
literaryscholarship."4
thingabout his critiqueofWilhelm
Scherer,a proponentof this methodology,is the connectionit reveals between
monumentaland antiquarianliteraryscholarship.Scherer'snotionof a 600-year
rhythmof literaryhistoryproduceda way of counting"rosarybeads" whichBen-

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18

CarolineNewman

I thinkthis
jamin comparesto a "trimphant
processionofideal Germanfigures."35
calls
to
mind
other
that
of
"processionaltriumph" the history
quote appropriately
ofthevictors.But evenmoreimportantly
it could serveto describethemonumental
associatedwiththeGeorgeCircle.
literaryhistorythenbeingwrittenby professors
In Kommerell'sThePoetas "FiRhrer"
in German
Classicism
and in Gundolf'sGoethe
or
his
and
the
German
one
indeed
finds
whatBenjaminterms
study
Shakespeare
Spirit,
an "AlexandrianPantheon"; thoughthe names have been changed,its canon of
authors is as fixedas that firstlist of "classics" establishedat the museum of
witha general"exorcismofhistory,"
Alexandria.Associatingthismonumentalism
of
on
assert
that
the
ideal
such
collectionis thedivisionofliterary
to
Benjamingoes
history"intosacredgroveswithtemplestoimmortalpoets."''36
Finally,as an antidote
to both the monumentaland antiquarianversionsof literaryhistory- to what
labels their"museum-like"
character- he arguesthatliterary
Benjaminspecifically
in
must
works
"not
connection
with
thetimein whichtheyappeared
history
present
. . but ratherin connectionwith the time that recognizesthem,namely,the
The timeofhistoricalcollection,ifitis tobreakwiththedead homogeneity
present."37
of a merely
collectedhistory,mustitselfbe historically
reflected.
This bringsus back to Benjamin'snotionof the mobilecollector,thatcollector
who, in comingto termswiththeremainsofthepast, operatesmorelikea bricoleur
than a connoisseur
of history.One can findthefigureofsuch a collectornotonlyin
Benjamin'sdiscussionof the historicalcollectorFuchs: he turnsup as well in the
essays on the surrealists,who mobilizethe past by bringingit into the shockof a
presentconstellation;on SiegfriedKracauer, who appears as a ragpickeron the
morningof a revolutionary
day; or even in Benjamin's notes on Baudelaire, the
scavengingallegoricist.What these figuresshare is a strategicuse of quotation
resistantto thesoporific
thedismemberment
spellofa reifiedtradition.Accordingly,
such quoting-out-of-context
even as it destructs.Paradoxientails,is constructive
cally,theviolenceBenjaminassociateswiththe rippingapart of a culturalbodyis
the only way of keepingits forceintact- as moveable,not immoveablehistory.
What is at stakehereis thedifference
betweenconservinghistoryin thecorpse-like
formof a fixedcorpusof textsand mobilizingthereservesof traditionin order,as
Benjaminwritesat the end of the essay on "LiteraryHistory,"thatthe "material
of historicalstudy"mightagain become an "agentof history."38
Such a collector,of course,is Benjaminhimself.His "mosaic technique"in the
ofpassagesin theso-calledPassagenarbeit,
Trauerspiel
studyas wellas hiscross-cutting
attestto his beliefthattraditionalculturalhistorycan onlytella traditionalstory,
one that "enlargesthe weightof treasuresaccumulatingon the back of humanity
withoutprovidingthe strengthto shake offthe burden,to take controlof it.""3 In
thissense,I think,themostemblematicfigureforBenjamin'snew collectorcannot
be thehunchbackas Hannah Arendthas suggested.40
For ifhe is notto be dwarfed
by theaccumulatingweightofhistory,thehunchbackmustgiveway to thebacker
of historicalhunches;like the Benjamin of the late "Theses," he plays forhigh
stakeswiththe chips of messianictime.
Then again, perhaps not, forthereis one last figureof the collector,one that
Benjamin celebratesin an earlieressay entitled"Unpacking my Library."This
collectoralso opposes thefixedorderofthemuseum,moreprecisely,ofthelibrary,

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ofTradition
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19

this timewiththe "disorderof book crates thathave been wrenchedopen."41 By

theend oftheessay,however,whenthebooksare again on theirshelves,theauthor
wants to disappear within"a dwellingcreated by books as buildingstones." It
seems appropriateto close withthiscollectoras he leaves so manyquestionsopen
about the strategiesofcollection.Should we carryon our work,as Benjaminhere
suggests,"in the guise of Spitzweg'sbookworm"- especiallyif this bookworm
believesthat"ownershipis the mostintimaterelationshipone can have to objects.
Not that theycome alive in [the collector];it is he who lives in them"?42
Even if
such a bookwormis more than a parasiteon the past, I thinkwe would want to
be suspiciousof a critiqueof public collectionresultingonlyin a retreatinto the
private.Nietzsche'sfearin EcceHomothathe too mightone day be canonized,is a
fearofthiscollectoras well.'3His dwellingtoo nearlyresembleswhatHeine might
call a "second,independentworld."
of California,
University
Berkeley
Notes
1. This talkwas presentedin a sessionon "The Institutionalization
ofLiterary
Studies." My originalplan had been to showhowthemuseum,alongwitha cluster
of relatedfigures("graveyards"of the past, "corpses"of tradition,etc.) functions
in Heine's, Nietzsche's,and Benjamin'scritiquesof an institutionalized
canon of
literaryand culturalartifacts.In the course of the workon thistalk,however,it
became clear thatthe issue of the canon was only halfof the "ghoststory"these
writerswantedto tell. In measuringthe dangerof an increasingly
reifiedpast cut
offfromcontemporary
as much
values,all threeargue thatantiquarianhistoricism
as monumentalcanonizationcan convertthepromiseofhistoryintothedead weight
of modernity.This two-sided"critiqueof collection,"and especiallythe shiftit
undergoesin the hundredyearsseperatingHeine fromBenjamin,formsthe broad
framework
of mytalk,publishedherewithonlyminorrevisions.
2. HeinrichHeine, Samtliche
ed. Klaus Briegleb(1976; rpt.Frankfurt:
Schriften,
to thiseditionwillbe givenbyvolume
Ullstein,1981),V, 72. Subsequentreferences
and page numberonly.Unlessotherwise
in thetextare mine.
noted,all translations
3. Heine, I, 445 and 455.
4. Heine,V, 463-465.Heineendstheentireworkbydistinguishing
moreparticularlybetweenFrenchand literary
(V,
ghosts
494-495).
5. Heine, V 372-373.
6. Heine, V 402.
7. Heine, V, 377.
8. Heine, V, 395-396.One can fallin love withGoethe'sstatues,Heine writes,
"aber sie sind unfruchtbar:
die GoetheschenDichtungenbringennichtdie Tat
hervor."For an excellentdiscussionoftheodd allusionto a "childless"Pygmalion
thatfollows,see HinrichSeeba, "Die Kinder des Pygmalion:Die Bildlichkeitdes
bei Heine. Beobachtungenzur TendenzwendederAsthetik,"
Deutsche
Kunstbegriffs

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CarolineNewman

20

undGeistesgedichte,
50, (1976), 158-202.
fir Literaturwissenschaft
Vierteljahrsschrifl
9. Heine, III, 110.
10. Heine, V, 393.
of
11. Heine, XI, 184. Severalcriticshave drawnattentionto Heine's treatment
Heineund
Heinrich
"Marmorbilder";see thechapterofthattitlein DorfSternberger,
derSiinde(Hamburg: Classen, 1972), 181-205;HinrichSeeba, "Die
dieAbschaffung
Heine'sReception
Kinder des Pygmalion";and RobertC. Holub, Heinrich
of German
in
the
First
Function
and
the
Hellenic
Tradition
The
Half ofthe
Application
of
Grecophilia:
Nineteenth
Reihe Siegen, 27, Germanist.Abt. (Heidelberg: Carl Winter,
Century,
1981), 74-79 and 174-175.
12. Heine, V 73.
13. Heine, V, 494.
in dreiBiinden,
14. FriedrichNietzsche,Werke
ed. Karl Schlecta,8th ed. (1966;
rpt. Munich: Hnaser, 1977), I, 137-141.Subsequent referenceswill be cited by
volumeand page number.
2ndWisconsin
15. Several articlesin the collection,Die Klassik-Legende,
Workshop,
ed.Reinhold
Grimm
andJostHermand,
18
Athendium,
Literatur,
zur
(Frankfurt:
Schriften
In particular,
1971),touchon theapotheosisofGoetheand Schillerin theGriinderzeit.
see Klaus L. Berghahn,"Von Weimarnach Versailles:Zur Entstehung
der KlassikLegende im 19 Jahrhundert,"50-78, esp. 70 ff.Paul Raabe treatsthe literal
im 19
"monumentalization"of German culturalfigures:"Dichterverherrlichung
zum ProblemihrerWechselJahrhundert,"in BildendeKunstundLiteratur:
Beitriige
im19Jahrhundert,
ed. Wolfdietrich
Rasch (Frankfurt:
Klostermann,1970),
beziehungen
79-97.
16. Nietzsche,I, 144.
17. Nietzsche,I, 137.
18. Nietzsche,I, 225 and 220.
19. Nietzsche,I, 228.
20. Nietzsche,I, 229.
21. Nietzsche,I, 210.
22. In thesectionentitled"Was ich den Altenverdanke,"written16 yearsafter
TheBirthofTragedy,
Nietzschestressestheconsistency
ofhis viewoftheGreeks(II,
1027-1032).WalterKaufmanntranslatesthepassage on the"psychologist"as folin the
lows: "to smell out 'beautifulsouls,' 'goldenmeans,' and otherperfections
Greeks,or to admiretheircalm in greatness,theirideal cast of mind,theirnoble
in me protectedme againstsuch 'noble simplicity,'
simplicity- the psychologist
a niaiserie
allemande
anyway... The magnificent
physicalsuppleness,theaudacious
realismand immoralismwhich distinguishedthe Hellene constituteda need,not
'nature.' It only resulted,it was not therefromthe start"; ThePortableNietzsche
(New York: Viking,1968).
23. AfterfinishingTwilight
of theIdols,Nietzscheplanned to writea four-part
workentitledTheTransvaluation
was completed,but
ofall Values.Only TheAntichrist
in the late Ecce HomoNietzschefrequently
invokesthe phrase, "die Umwertung
aller Wert,"by way ofsummarizinghis generalcriticalproject;see II, 1124; 1143;
1152.
24. Nietzsche,I, 261.

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ofTradition
Cemeteries

21

25. Nietzsche,I, 239.

26. The gallerymetaphorreoccursthroughout
theSecond
thisparticular
Meditation;
is
from
Nietzsche's
notebooks
of
the
same
Nachgelassene
Fragmente,
quote
period:
ed. GiorgioColli and Mazzino Montinari(Berlin:de Gruyter,
Kritische
Gesamtausgbe,
1978), Pt. 3, Vol. III, 248.
27. Nietzsche,I, 223.
28. Nietzsche,II, 62.
29. Walter Benjamin, Gesammelte
ed. Rolf Tiedemann and Herman
Schriften,
Edition Suhrkamp,1980), IV (1),
Schweppenhauser(1972-1974;rpt. Frankfurt:
398. In this and subsequentreferencesto the Werkausgabe
edition,I followthe
in
used
the
and
tables
of
contents:the Roman
practice
chronological
alphabetical
numeralpreservesthe major divisionsof the firstSuhrkampedition;the Arabic
numeral,in parentheses,indicatessubdivisions,followedby page number.
30. Quoted in Benjamin's essay, "Edward Fuchs, der Sammlerund der Historiker,"11(2), 502.
31. Benjamin,I (2), 696. The "Theses" have been translatedby HarryZohn in
ed. Hannah Arendt(New York: Schocken,1969), 253-264.
Benjamin,Illuminations,
I have
Exceptfora fewminorchangesin thedirectionofa moreliteralrendering,
used thistranslation,
citedas Illuminations
in the Notes.
32. Benjamin,I (2), 696 and 701; Illuminations,
255 and 261.
33. Benjamin,I (2), 702 and 704; Illuminations,
262 and 263.
34. Benjamin,III, 285. "Sammeln und Hegen," awkwardlytranslatedhere as
"collectingand cherishing,"is a catch-phraseof the Biedermmeier
period.
35. Benjamin,III, 285.
36. Benjamin,III, 289.
37. Benjamin,III, 290.
38. Benjamin,III, 290.
39. Benjamin,11(2), 478.
40. Hannah Arendttitlesthe firstsectionof her Introductionto Illuminations,
"The Hunchback."

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