Benjamin, Barthes and the Singularity of Photography

Acknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
List of Illustrations

Introduction

Benjamin and Barthes: The Question of Influence

Part One: The Birth of the Viewer
1. Benjamin's History of Photography
2. Alter Ego: The Childhood Portrait of Franz Kafka
3. Photography, Memory and Redemption

Part Two: Photography and Subjectivity
4. From Semiology to Phenomenology
5. Lost and Found: The Winter Garden Photograph
6. Photography and Memory: Barthes's Proustian Quest

Postscript: Singularity and Photography in the Age of Digitisation

Bibliography
Index

Kathrin Yacavone teaches in the Department of French and Francophone Studies at the University of Nottingham, UK.

"Meticulously tracing the network of connections between Benjamin's and Barthes's visions of the encounter between photograph and viewer, this book performs an invaluable critical service. Kathrin Yacavone's discussion will be required reading for anyone seriously interested in photographic phenomenology or who has ever felt the singular impact of a photographic image." -- Michael Sheringham, FBA, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature, All Souls College, University of Oxford, UK "This first book-length comparative study of Benjamin's and Barthes's work on photography addresses head-on the ethical phenomena involved in producing and reading photography." - Elizabeth Stewart, Associate Professor of English, Yeshiva University, New York and author of Catastrophe and Survival: Walter Benjamin and Psychoanalysis. "The book offers a detailed comparison of two of the most influential photography critics/theorists in the 20th century. While Benjamin and Barthes are often mentioned alongside each other, their respective theories have not been systematically and extensively compared. Given the towering status of both writers both within (critical) theory more generally and within photography studies more specifically, this study will mark a welcome addition to two important and further expanding fields of scholarship." -- Carolin Duttlinger, University Lecturer in German & Fellow of Wadham College, University of Oxford, UK