Resumen

COHEN, Esther. Walter Benjamin y Franz Kafka: dos pepenadores en busca del mesianismo profano. Acta poét [online]. 2007, vol.28, n.1-2, pp.49-71. ISSN 2448-735X.

The present essay tries to relate Benjamin's figure of the ragpicker with Kafka's bestiary. How do the presence of the rag picker in the works of Benjamin and the apparition of oppressed animals in Kafka represent the ways that lead to "redemption"? Precisely a profane redemption, nevertheless that Benjamin uses the categories of Jewish messianism. In both authors we ind a particular enthusiasm for those igures which had been excluded from history and kept apart from society and, notwithstanding this, they contain a great messianic force.