WALTER BENJAMIN’İN MOSKOVA GÜNLÜĞÜ
WALTER BENJAMIN’S MOSCOW DIARY

Summary/Abstract: This study examines Walter Benjamin’s Moscow Diary and his essay entitled Moscow through their political, cultural, and philosophical dimensions. The diary demonstrates that Benjamin’s two-month stay in Moscow during 1926– 1927 was far more than a collection of personal impressions; it gave rise to philosophical inquiries into the dissolution of the modern subject, the impoverishment of experience, and the political structure of time. Benjamin portrays Moscow as a city caught between the lingering hope of the revolution and the increasingly intensifying pressure of Stalinist bureaucracy. Everyday life in Moscow is evaluated through collectivization policies, microfascist behavioral patterns, and a new caste-like hierarchy defined by loyalty to the Party. In parallel with his essay Capitalism as Religion, in which Benjamin argues that capitalism assumes a religious form, he also maintains that the Soviet system operates as a political “religion” governed by its own rituals and disciplinary mechanisms. The Moscow experience further concretizes Benjamin’s radical critiques of history, modernity, and the notion of progress. Ultimately, the Diary offers a comprehensive analysis of an atmosphere in which revolutionary hope has dissipated, the desire for power has become a central organizing force, and the possibilities of emancipation for the modern human being have progressively narrowed.

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