This momentous study of Benjamin's critical practice marks a sea change in Eagleton's thought. Its goal is not merely to contemplate Benjamin's approach to language, history, and art but to chart a dynamic new course for contemporary socialist criticism. To do this, Eagleton brushes Benjamin's Trauerspiel against seventeenth-century British literature, tests his concept of the 'aura' against Freud and Lacan, and undertakes his most sustained engagement with Derrida and the political crossroads of deconstruction.