There are many different gifts many of us owe to Professor
Tadeusz Sławek. The one which stands out for me is the practice
of reading, such reading that takes its time, that is patient and
respectful of details, but which also takes risks in making
unconventional connections, that negotiates between the inside
and the outside of a literary text. And which does not have to
arrive to a conclusion to make sense. Hence the following piece
which engages, along these very lines, with Edgar Allan Poe’s
short story, “The Man of the Crowd,” once given such prominence
through Walter Benjamin’s writings[…
