PHILOSOPHER

Walter Benjamin

1892 - 1940

Photo of Walter Benjamin

Icon of person Walter Benjamin

Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin (; German: [ˈvaltɐ ˈbɛnjamiːn] ; 15 July 1892 – 26 September 1940) was a German Jewish philosopher, cultural critic, media theorist, and essayist. An eclectic thinker who combined elements of German idealism, Romanticism, Western Marxism, Jewish mysticism, and Neo-Kantianism, Benjamin made influential contributions to aesthetic theory, literary criticism, and historical materialism. He was associated with the Frankfurt School and also maintained formative friendships with thinkers such as playwright Bertolt Brecht and Kabbalah scholar Gershom Scholem. Read more on Wikipedia

Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Walter Benjamin has received more than 2,616,716 page views. His biography is available in 69 different languages on Wikipedia (up from 67 in 2019). Walter Benjamin is the 92nd most popular philosopher (up from 95th in 2019), the 115th most popular biography from Germany (up from 117th in 2019) and the 13th most popular German Philosopher.

Walter Benjamin was a German Jewish philosopher, cultural critic, and essayist. His most famous work is "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction."

Memorability Metrics

  • 2.6M

    Page Views (PV)

  • 74.40

    Historical Popularity Index (HPI)

  • 69

    Languages Editions (L)

  • 10.12

    Effective Languages (L*)

  • 3.30

    Coefficient of Variation (CV)

Page views of Walter Benjamins by language

Over the past year Walter Benjamin has had the most page views in the with 363,110 views, followed by German (157,643), and Spanish (121,956). In terms of yearly growth of page views the top 3 wikpedia editions are Ido (83.13%), West Frisian (78.19%), and Simple English (74.58%)

Among PHILOSOPHERS

Among philosophers, Walter Benjamin ranks 92 out of 1,267. Before him are Athanasius of Alexandria, Peter Abelard, Theophrastus, Johann Gottfried Herder, Ibn Taymiyyah, and Leucippus. After him are Zhuang Zhou, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, Jean Bodin, Boethius, Jeremy Bentham, and George Gurdjieff.

Most Popular Philosophers in Wikipedia

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous

Contemporaries

Among people born in 1892, Walter Benjamin ranks 6. Before him are J. R. R. Tolkien, Josip Broz Tito, Francisco Franco, Manfred von Richthofen, and Ivo Andrić. After him are Zita of Bourbon-Parma, Arthur Seyss-Inquart, Haile Selassie, Alexander Alekhine, Pearl S. Buck, and Ryūnosuke Akutagawa. Among people deceased in 1940, Walter Benjamin ranks 5. Before him are Leon Trotsky, Selma Lagerlöf, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Paul Klee. After him are Neville Chamberlain, J. J. Thomson, Mikhail Bulgakov, Robert Wadlow, Nikolai Yezhov, Carl Bosch, and Peter Behrens.

Others Born in 1892

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous

Others Deceased in 1940

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous

In Germany

Among people born in Germany, Walter Benjamin ranks 115 out of 7,253. Before him are Alfred Wegener (1880), Albert Speer (1905), Clara Zetkin (1857), Bruce Willis (1955), Theodor W. Adorno (1903), and Nikolaus Otto (1832). After him are Charles the Fat (839), Carl Wilhelm Scheele (1742), Ludwig II of Bavaria (1845), Leni Riefenstahl (1902), Novalis (1772), and Wim Wenders (1945).

Others born in Germany

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous

Among PHILOSOPHERS In Germany

Among philosophers born in Germany, Walter Benjamin ranks 13. Before him are Ludwig Feuerbach (1804), Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (1775), Karl Jaspers (1883), Jürgen Habermas (1929), Carl von Clausewitz (1780), and Nicholas of Cusa (1401). After him are Meister Eckhart (1260), Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767), Rudolf Christoph Eucken (1846), Johann Friedrich Herbart (1776), Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900), and Friedrich Fröbel (1782).

German born Philosophers

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous