This episode of Long Read is sponsored by Haymarket Books.

This September, Haymarket organizing socialism 2022, the biggest socialist conference in

North America.

It runs from September 2nd to September 5th in Chicago.

Speakers like Root Wilson Gilmore, Robin Kelly, and David Harvey will be there to discuss

radical politics, history, and strategy with hundreds of activists.

You can find out more at socialismconference.org, anyone who registers before July 8th,

will receive a discount rate.

Hello and you're very welcome to Long Read, the Jacobin podcast where we look in depth

at political topics and thinkers.

My name's Daniel Finn, and the features editor here at Jacobin, and I'll be presenting

the show.

The German writer Walter Benjamin has become one of the most influential cultural theorists

of the last century.

Benjamin took his own life in September 1940 to avoid falling into the hands of the

Nazis.

His unorthodox Marxism and ideas about culture and history have inspired several generations

of critical thought, but the world made by capitalism.

Our guest today is Esther Leslie.

She's a leading authority on Benjamin's life and work, who teaches at Berkbeck University

in London.

How do you summarize the phases in which Walter Benjamin's work has been understood and

...