Complete catalog available from pumpkinhollow.net/thebarn
Creating Anarchy by Ron Sakolsky
(Fifth Estate Books 2005) $15
Twenty chapters in a dynamic collage of ideas and action. This vibrant collection glows with flames of discontent and defiance and flows with waves of laughter and possibility. Ranging widely from Mayday to Utopia, from Refusal to Autonomy, and from Insurrection to Imagination, this compilation is in turn defiant, reflective, and playful–a brick for hurling through the windows of despair and a doorway to creating an anarchy that is not afraid to dream.
I Am Not A Man, I Am Dynamite! Friedrich Nietzsche and the Anarchist Tradition, edited by John Moore with Spencer Sunshine (Autonomedia 2004) $15
This anthology covers the historical, political and philosophical linkages between philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche and the anarchist tradition. Nietzsche shared with anarchists the vision of the total transformation of everyday life. Contributors include editor John Moore, Peter Lamborn Wilson, Max Cafard and Allan Antliff (all past Fifth Estate contributors), as well as Guy Aldred, Daniel Colson, Andrew Koch, Saul Newman, Jonathan Purkis, Franco Riccio and Leigh Starcross.
Against History; Against Leviathan by Fredy Perlman (Black & Red 1983) $7
It has now been twenty years since the death of my friend Fredy Perlman, one of the most memorable people I have ever known. My encounter with his wit, his powerful sense of justice, and his fierce intellectual and moral independence had a lasting impact on me.
I don’t know what he would be thinking or writing or creating now–he was always evolving–but I often find myself examining my own evolution against my understanding of his manifold intuitions into growth, reason, and what we might call, after Blake, the “contraries” that underlie history’s ironies and tragedies, and indeed life itself.
Fredy defied every limitation of definition or ideology. He was an individual in the best sense of the word–unique, striving, and sometimes jagged and stony around his edges, like the sandpaper book cover on a Situationist text that rubs and corrodes every simplistic assumption or single-minded answer in its periphery.
Blake’s motto in “Jerusalem” could have been Fredy’s: “I must Create a System or be enslav’d by another Man’s. I will not Reason & Compare: my business is to Create.”
I miss all that we have missed in those twenty years.
–David Watson
Recipes for Disaster (CrimethInc 2005) $12
Just in time for your next action or affinity group meeting, the creative collaborators known as CrimethInc. have released their own version of an anarchist cookbook. With over 600 pages of practical anecdotes and tactical testimonials, this weighty manual was printed practically at cost, to make it more readily available to revolutionaries.
After the Deluge: A Novel of Post-Economic San Francisco by Chris Carlsson (Full Enjoyment Books 2004) $14
Carlsson reveals his vivid future vision in a provocative journey to the Bay Area of 2157. More an imaginary treasure map than utopia-by-the-numbers blueprint. In an abundant society where all work is voluntary and everything is free, Carlsson’s characters pose complicated dilemmas in a new world that maintains bizarre similarities to the civilization it left behind. See review, p. 44.
The Wobblies! A Graphic History of the Industrial Workers of the World edited by Paul Buhle and Nicole Schulman, Verso, $25 Review, p. 43.
Book distribution has been a mainstay of this publication for thirty years. We feature books by Fifth Estate editors, contributors, collaborators, friends, and other books that have either been read or recommended by members of our collective. If you have a book you’d like to see offered here, send it along. The Barn is a rural library, literature distro, residence and recording studio. Contact us in advance to schedule a visit. The Barn also produces shows and offers internships that combine cooperative living with experience in writing, research, and rural survival, all in a beautiful rustic environment. College credit may be available. Contact us for more information or to check on orders: 615.536.5022 or email: thebarn@bolobonobo.org
How to Order from The Barn:
We accept checks, money orders, or well-concealed cash; payment made out to Fifth Estate Books. No electronic orders or payments accepted.Shipping and handling, please add $2 for first item, $1 for the next, and $.50 for each subsequent item. Allow 2-4 weeks for delivery. Send orders to PO Box 6, Liberty, TN 37095.