本文聚焦本雅明的“收藏”思想，通过回归其收藏活动、对“收藏”展开论述的历史背景，结合其生平与思想脉络，追溯本雅明收藏理论的逻辑起点，理清本雅明的“收藏”思想涉及哪些维度，挖掘其中的对话关系。本文的目标在于论证：本雅明的“收藏”观念是其认识论的缩影。

全文包含四个章节：前言意在说明收藏折射出主体对历史和文化的认知，因此可作为本雅明认识论的缩影成为研究对象；四章分别从本雅明思想的主要面向梳理了其收藏观念的重要突破和转向，从本雅明关于收藏的一手论述出发，追溯其理论成型的背景和对话对象。第一部分对应于本雅明青年时期对儿童教育的关注，经由其童年经历、童书和玩具收藏实践分析其将收藏观与儿童特质相勾连的原因，描述在语言哲学和布莱希特的“间离效果”（Verfremdungseffekt）等理论影响下，本雅明将收藏从直觉性爱好提炼为一种自觉性方法论的过程；第二部分对应于20–30年代本雅明对技术的思考，特别关注在可技术复制时代，阿多诺、瓦莱里、普鲁斯特等人如何看待博物馆收藏的展览价值，阐释本雅明对技术复制时代私人收藏与博物馆收藏的辩证态度；第三部分围绕两个主要文本《文学史与文学学》和《爱德华·福克斯：收藏家与历史学家》，梳理本雅明以收藏为隐喻质疑艺术史学科的合法性，并从收藏隐喻入手追溯至其与尼采、福楼拜的对话；第四部分围绕本雅明提出的三个新的时间标准——“衰落时代”、“不完善的新事物”以及“转瞬即逝”之物，呈现这些藏品选择标准从何而来，阐释其收藏观如何超越了藏品选择的古今之争。

This article focuses on Walter Benjamin’s concept of “collecting.” By examining his collecting activities, discussing the historical background of “collecting,” and combining his life and intellectual context, it traces the logical starting point of Benjamin’s collecting’ theory. It aims to clarify the dimensions involved in Benjamin’s thought of “collecting” and explore the dialogical relationships within. The goal of this article is to demonstrate that Benjamin’s idea of “collecting” is a microcosm of his epistemology.

The body of the essay is divided into four chapters. The preface aims to explain how collecting reflects the subject’s knowledge of history and culture, thus serving as a microcosm of Benjamin’s epistemology for research. Each of the four chapters focuses on a distinct aspect of Benjamin’s thinking, tracking the important developments and alterations in his theory of collecting. Beginning with Benjamin’s personal discussions about collecting, the chapters delve into the context and the individuals who shaped Benjamin’s views.

The first section focuses on Benjamin’s early interest in childhood education, analyzing how his childhood experiences and collections of children’s literature and toys relate his thoughts on collecting to the qualities of children. It illustrates how, motivated by thoughts like linguistic theory and Brecht’s “Verfremdungseffekt,” Benjamin altered collecting from an intuitive hobby into a self–conscious methodology.

The second section corresponds to Benjamin’s observations on technology from the 1920s to the 1930s, with a special emphasis on how figures such as Adorno, Valéry, and Proust saw the exhibition value of museum collections in the age of technological reproducibility. It explains Benjamin’s dialectical approach to private collecting and museum collections in the age of technological reproducibility.

The third section focuses on two primary pieces, “The Origin of German Tragic Drama” and “Eduard Fuchs: Collector and Historian,” in which Benjamin uses collecting as a metaphor to question the legitimacy of art history as a discipline. It can be traced back to his conversations with Nietzsche and Flaubert, using the metaphor of collecting.

The fourth section focuses on Benjamin’s three new standards of time: the “time of decline,” the “bad new things,” and “flitting by.” It looks at the provenance of these standards and explains how his perspectives on collecting go beyond the debates surrounding collection selection in the past.