The Improvised City: Mapping Walter Benjamin's Moscow (1926-27) [Olga]

Introduction

This project seeks to render in spatial form a text that has long captivated scholars of urban theory and the Soviet Union: "The Moscow Diary" of the German philosopher and critic Walter Benjamin, who meticulously recorded his visit to the Soviet capital during the winter of 1926-27. The text of the diary, comprising nearly two months of daily entries and spanning approximately 100 pages, forms the basis of this data.

Benjamin arrived in Moscow on Dec. 6, 1926, to find a city in the pangs of transformation. A period of limited capitalism introduced several years earlier under the New Economic Policy (NEP) had resulted in the rise of small-scale enterprise, the electrification and rapid growth of infrastructure, and a flowering of cultural activity. Remnants of Russia's peasant lifestyle now mingled with the newly rich entrepreneurs and speeding trams of the modernizing metropolis. The city appeared to function according to its own rules, seemingly improvised on the spot and shrouded in a veil of mystery by the snowy Moscow winter.

Relying on his German-speaking acquaintances for guidance and translation, Benjamin immersed himself in the daily bustle of the world's first Communist capital in an attempt to "render the physiognomy" of its new rhythm and determine his own role in the socialist experiment. But his failure to secure a series of professional projects — as well as his inability to consummate a personal relationship that had largely been responsible for bringing him to Moscow — resulted in Benjamin's eventual disenchantment with his prospects in Moscow and with the Soviet project more broadly. His departure from the city on Feb. 1, 1927 came amid the increasing consolidation of political power under Joseph Stalin, who would abolish the NEP and impose a rigid system of control the following year.

View the project in StoryMaps.

This layer shows the locations Walter Benjamin visited in Moscow during his two-month visit. The size of the symbol corresponds to the frequency of visits.

This layer depicts places where Benjamin experienced confusion or misunderstanding due to his Russian language skills, which were practically nonexistent.

Users of the map can compare Benjamin's frequented locations to a tourist itinerary recommended by a 1926 official Soviet guidebook.

Goals of the Project

"The Moscow Diary" has been the subject of much scholarly work, but until now there appears to have been no attempt to create a comprehensive visualization of Benjamin's activity during his time in the city. In addition to filling this gap, the project pursues a three-fold aim:

first, to present a cartographic narrative of Benjamin’s movements through the city in an attempt to better understand what he saw and experienced during this volatile period of Moscow's history;
second, to visualize the parts of the city which Benjamin visited most often – as well as those he did not see – so as to question how his movement affected his experience and understanding of Moscow and the Soviet project it represented;
and third, to plot the qualitative aspects of Benjamin’s experience, including his encounter with the disappearance of private space and his difficulties with the Russian language, in order to see how these instances of disappointment and misunderstanding may have affected his ultimate decision to leave Moscow and abandon his thoughts of joining the Communist Party.

Through a multi-layered inquiry of the text, to be accompanied by textual and photographic materials in the form of a StoryMap, we may begin to develop a better understanding of one foreigner's experience with the Soviet project on the eve of the onset of Stalinism. It is my hope that this material will prove useful in facilitating a deeper study of foreign visitors to the Soviet Union, in helping to uncover potential meetings and missed connections, and in shedding light on the possibilities and consequences of travel.