Persona. Analytical inquiry on forms of the self in the representation of metropolis

This paper aims at investigating the textual relations that link the thoughts of Walter Benjamin (The Arcades Project) and Simmel (The Metropolis and Mental Life and The Philosophy of Money) in a common reflection on the self in the context of metropolis. The paper builds-up a constellation of terms (perception, myth, habits, distraction, images, discontinuity, consciousness, lifestyle and media), a plot of motifs that composes an organic pattern and provide a problematic image of the self.