The American and European face

Walter Benjamin was, an uber European intellectual, was, however, a person of the greatest reserve.

Even where he lets himself go with people he trusted, one had the feeling not of the revelation of some true inner self but merely of the relaxation of that reserve.

The reserve that grows like a mask on the skin of your face

The extraordinarily stiff manner of a central European bourgeoisie – which sought no doubt to designate a certain class pride by its eschewal of aristocratic nonchalance and easiness, as well as of the barbarism and ignorance of country nobles in general – is appropriated and made part of the personality, like a mask that grows onto the skin of your face.

A reserve that expresses fear.

Such a reserve may well also express fear, both of the rituals of a class you detest and devote your life to undermining, and of the artificialities of the artists who secede from it.

No American equivalent

It is in any case very European, and has no American equivalent, even where writers like Henry James have thought it desirable to produce one.