World Food Books

A Moratorium on New Construction
by Charlotte Malterre-Barthes

2026, English
Softcover (w. dust jacket), 238 pages, 15 x 10.5 cm
Published by Sternberg Press / Berlin

$36.00 - In stock -

A massive value shift for existing buildings, infrastructure, materials, unbuilt land, earth, and the labor that holds our world together.

To build is to destroy, writes Charlotte Malterre-Barthes. From steel bolts to concrete blocks to wood flooring to polyester insulation panels, every single component of the built environment is the product of extractive processes. Driven by greedy economies, the global enterprise of space production expands, impacting climate, earth, water, humans, and non-humans everywhere. However housing is both a human right and the mandate of design disciplines: How to navigate the need for housing versus the destructive practice of construction?

To pause new construction-even if momentarily, creates a radical thinking framework for alternatives to the current regime of space production and its suspect growth imperative. Engaging with unsettling questions, A Moratorium on New Construction envisions a massive value shift for our existing stock. From housing redistribution to reinviting value generation, from anti-extractive measures to profound structural changes, from curricula reforms to purging the exploitative culture of the office, an entire rewiring of design processes and construction lays ahead. Somewhere between a thought experiment and a call for action, A Moratorium on New Construction is a leap of faith to envision a less extractive future, made of what we have: Not demolishing, not building new, but building less, building with what exists, inhabiting it differently, and caring for it.

File under: Charlotte Malterre-Barthes Sternberg Press / Berlin Architecture / Interior Theory / Essay Sociology / Politics

OUT OF ACTIONS: Between Performance and The Object, 1949-1979
by Paul Schimmel

1998, English
Softcover, 408 pages, 31 x 22 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by Thames and Hudson / London

$55.00 - Out of stock

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First edition of Out of Actions: Between Performance and the Object, 1949-1979, edited by Paul Schimmel, published in 1998. with essays by Kristine Stiles, Guy Brett, Hubert Klocker, Shinichiro Osaki, and Paul Schimmel.

Published to coincide with the first major museum exhibition to examine the complex relationship linking the creative process, action or performance, and works of art in the postwar period. Featuring nearly one hundred and fifty artists and collaboratives from approximately twenty countries in Eastern and Western Europe, the Middle East, Asia, Japan, and North and South America—including figures associated with the New York School, Nouveaux Realistes, Fluxus, Viennese Actionists, Hi Red Center, Arte Povera, the Gutai group, happenings, process art, and performance art—the exhibition centered on how the possibilities and implications of using time and process as elements of art were realized by a number of international movements during this influential thirty-year period.

Covering three decades of significant and original art, this lavishly illustrated book features work by more than one hundred artists from across the world who have had a profound impact on the relationship between visual and performance art in the postwar era.

Includes the work of: Marina Abramović, Vito Acconci, Genpei Akasegawa, Laurie Anderson, Eleanor Antin, Rasheed Araeen, Mowry Baden, Artur Barrio, Jerzy Beres, Joseph Beuys, Mark Boyle & Joan Hills, George Brecht, Stuart Brisley, Robert Delford Brown, Rhett Delford Brown, Günter Brus, Chris Burden, James Lee Byars, John Cage, Marc Camille Chaimowicz, Lygia Clark, Pinchas Cohen Gan, Collective Action Group, Houston Conwill, Paul Cotton, COUM Transmissions, Guy de Cointet, Jim Dine, John Duncan, Felipe Ehrenberg, Roberto Evangelista, VALIE EXPORT, Robert Filliou, Rose Finn-Kelcey, Sherman Fleming, Lucio Fontana, Terry Fox, Howard Fried, Gideon Gechtman, Jochen Gerz, Gilbert & George, Alberto Greco, Ion Grigorescu, Victor Grippo, Red Grooms, Guerrilla Art Action Group, David Hammons, Al Hansen, Maren Hassinger, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Dick Higgins, Tatsumi Hijikata, Susan Hiller, Hi Red Center, Rebecca Horn, Tehching Hsieh, Joan Jonas, Kim Jones, Michel Journiac, Akira Kanayama, Tadeusz Kantor, Allan Kaprow, Mike Kelley, Jürgen Klauke, Yves Klein, Milan Knížák, Alison Knowles, Komar & Melamid, Jannis Kounellis, Shigeko Kubota, Tetsumi Kudo, Yayoi Kusama, Leslie Labowitz, Suzanne Lacy, John Latham, Jean-Jacques Lebel, Lea Lublin, George Maciunas, Leopoldo Maler, Piero Manzoni, Tom Marioni, Cusi Masuda, Georges Mathieu, Gordon Matta-Clark, Paul McCarthy, Bruce McLean, David Medalla, Cildo Meireles, Ana Mendieta, Gustav Metzger, Marta Minujín, Jan Mlčoch, Linda Montano, Charlotte Moorman, Robert Morris, Otto Muehl, Saburo Murakami, Natsuyuki Nakanishi, Bruce Nauman, Paul Neagu, Senga Nengudi, Joshua Neustein, Hermann Nitsch, Hélio Oiticica, Claes Oldenburg, Yoko Ono, Orlan, Raphael Montañez Ortiz, Lorenzo Pace, Nam June Paik, Gina Pane, Lygia Pape, Giuseppe Pinot Gallizio, Adrian Piper, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Jackson Pollock, William Pope.L, Robert Rauschenberg, Carlyle Reedy, Klaus Rinke, Ulrike Rosenbach, Dieter Roth, Zorka Ságlová, Niki de Saint Phalle, Alfons Schilling, Tomas Schmit, Carolee Schneemann, Rudolf Schwarzkogler, Bonnie Ora Sherk, Shōzō Shimamoto, Ushio Shinohara, Kazuo Shiraga, Barbara T. Smith, Daniel Spoerri, Petr Štembera, Wolfgang Stöerchle, Jirō Takamatsu, Atsuko Tanaka, Mark Thompson, Jean Tinguely, Rasa Todosijević, Kerry Trengove, Ulay, Ben Vautier, Wolf Vostell, Franz Erhard Walther, Peter Weibel, Franz West, Hannah Wilke, Emmett Williams, Zaj.

Their work encompasses sculpture, artists' publications, drawings, photographs, and the ephemera that arises from the performance, as well as documentary film and video stills.

Published in conjunction with a major touring exhibition organized by The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Out of Actions illuminates the unique relationship between action, destruction, performance, and the creative process, in essays by acclaimed art historians. Covering an unprecedented range of material, the book offers the first critical comparisons of work that has previously been viewed as distinctly regional and unrelated.

With 450 illustrations, 200 in colour.

VG copy with light wear and "The Grid" written in red marker on the block side (?).

File under: Joseph Beuys Chris Burden John Cage Lygia Clark Yves Klein John Latham Bruce Nauman Hélio Oiticica Claes Oldenburg Yoko Ono Robert Rauschenberg Niki de Saint Phalle Carolee Schneemann Atsuko Tanaka Jean Tinguely Marina Abramovič Jerzy Bereś Zorka Saglova Raphael Montanez Ortiz Petr Stembera Wolfgang Stoerchle Rasa Todosijevic Vito Acconci Genpei Akasegawa Laurie Anderson Eleanor Antin Rasheed Araeen Mowry Baden Artur Barrio Mark Boyle & Joan Hills George Brecht Stuart Brisley Robert Delford Brown Rhett Delford Brown Günter Brus James Lee Byars Marc Camille Chaimowicz Pinchas Cohen Gan Collective Action Group Houston Conwill Paul Cotton COUM Transmissions Guy de Cointet Jim Dine John Duncan Felipe Ehrenberg Roberto Evangelista VALIE EXPORT Robert Filliou Rose Finn-Kelcey Sherman Fleming Lucio Fontana Terry Fox Howard Fried Gideon Gechtman Jochen Gerz Gilbert & George Alberto Greco Ion Grigorescu Victor Grippo Red Grooms Guerrilla Art Action Group David Hammons Al Hansen Maren Hassinger Lynn Hershman Leeson Dick Higgins Tatsumi Hijikata Susan Hiller Hi Red Center Rebecca Horn Tehching Hsieh Joan Jonas Kim Jones Michel Journiac Akira Kanayama Tadeusz Kantor Allan Kaprow Mike Kelley Jürgen Klauke Milan Knížák Alison Knowles Komar & Melamid Jannis Kounellis Shigeko Kubota Tetsumi Kudo Yayoi Kusama Leslie Labowitz Suzanne Lacy Jean-Jacques Lebel Lea Lublin George Maciunas Leopoldo Maler Piero Manzoni Tom Marioni Cusi Masuda Georges Mathieu Gordon Matta-Clark Paul McCarthy Bruce McLean David Medalla Cildo Meireles Ana Mendieta Gustav Metzger Marta Minujín Jan Mlčoch Linda Montano Charlotte Moorman Robert Morris Otto Muehl Saburo Murakami Natsuyuki Nakanishi Paul Neagu Senga Nengudi Joshua Neustein Hermann Nitsch Orlan Lorenzo Pace Nam June Paik Gina Pane Lygia Pape Giuseppe Pinot Gallizio Adrian Piper Michelangelo Pistoletto Jackson Pollock William Pope.L Carlyle Reedy Klaus Rinke Ulrike Rosenbach Dieter Roth Alfons Schilling Tomas Schmit Rudolf Schwarzkogler Bonnie Ora Sherk Shōzō Shimamoto Ushio Shinohara Kazuo Shiraga Barbara T. Smith Daniel Spoerri Jirō Takamatsu Mark Thompson Kerry Trengove Ulay Ben Vautier Wolf Vostell Franz Erhard Walther Peter Weibel Franz West Hannah Wilke Emmett Williams Zaj Paul Schimmel Kristine Stiles Guy Brett Hubert Klocker Shinichiro Osaki Thames and Hudson / London Group Shows / Collections Out-of-print / Rare Performance / Dance / Theater Transgressive / Visceral / Abject Sound / Music Fluxus Nouveau Réalisme / Zero / Kinetic Dada Art Sculpture / Installation Film / Video Conceptual Art Feminism Sociology / Politics Theory / Essay Painting Drawing

Feminist Avant-Garde
Art of the 1970s in the Verbund Collection, Vienna

2020, English
Hardcover (w. dust jacket), 672 pages, 29 x 24 cm
Published by Prestel / Munich

$125.00 - In stock -

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Now available again in an expanded edition and featuring a variety of work from artists both well-known and under the radar, this volume explores the pioneering achievements of the Feminist Avant-Garde.

For art history, the 1970s represent the beginning of women subverting culturally and socially established constructions and traditional norms. Second-wave feminism, with its slogan "The personal is political", challenged the one-dimensional roles assigned to women--mother, housewife, and spouse. During this period, women artists radically questioned their duties and created a plurality of self-determined representations of themselves. Rejecting traditional male-dominated techniques, such as painting, these artists made use of new media, such as photography, film, video, and performance. The outcome was artwork which was radical, poetic, ironic, bitter, cynical, and heartfelt. This book features more than seventy international female artists, including works by Martha Rosler, Mary Beth Edelson, Ana Mendieta, Nil Yalter, and Ulrike Rosenbach. Editor Gabriele Schor used the term Feminist Avant-Garde in order to emphasize the role that these artists played in the last four decades. This new edition has been enriched with twenty-five new artists–Emma Amos, Dara Birnbaum, Rose English, Natalia LL, among others–as well as up-to-date research on feminist exhibitions, catalogues, and periodicals. Each artist is introduced by an essay and the book also includes fascinating texts by leading scholars.

Features the work of: Helena Almeida, Eleanor Antin, Annekke Barger, Lynda Benglis, Judith Bernstein, Renate Bertlmann, Teresa Burga, Marcella Campagnano, Judy Chicago, Linda Christanell, Lili Dujourie, Mary Beth Edelson, Renate Eisenegger, Valie Export, Esther Ferrer, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Alexis Hunter, Sanja Iveković, Birgit Jürgenssen, Kirsten Justesen, Ketty La Rocca, Leslie Labowitz, Katalin Ladik, Brigitte Lang, Suzanne Lacy, Suzy Lake, Karin Mack, Ana Mendieta, Rita Myers, Lorraine O’Grady, Orlan, Gina Pane, Letítia Parente, Ewa Partum, Friederike Pezold, Margot Pilz, Ulrike Rosenbach, Martha Rosler, Suzanne Santoro, Carolee Schneemann, Lydia Schouten, Cindy Sherman, Penny Slinger, Annegret Soltau, Hannah Wilke, Martha Wilson, Francesca Woodman, Nil Yalter...

File under: Helena Almeida Eleanor Antin Annekke Barger Lynda Benglis Judith Bernstein Renate Bertlmann Teresa Burga Marcella Campagnano Judy Chicago Linda Christanell Lili Dujourie Mary Beth Edelson Renate Eisenegger Valie Export Esther Ferrer Lynn Hershman Leeson Alexis Hunter Sanja Iveković Birgit Jürgenssen Kirsten Justesen Ketty La Rocca Leslie Labowitz Katalin Ladik Brigitte Lang Suzanne Lacy Suzy Lake Karin Mack Ana Mendieta Rita Myers Lorraine O’Grady Orlan Gina Pane Letítia Parente Ewa Partum Friederike Pezold Margot Pilz Ulrike Rosenbach Martha Rosler Suzanne Santoro Carolee Schneemann Lydia Schouten Cindy Sherman Penny Slinger Annegret Soltau Hannah Wilke Martha Wilson Francesca Woodman Nil Yalter Gabriele Schor Prestel / Munich Art Feminism Group Shows / Collections Conceptual Art Performance / Dance / Theater Sculpture / Installation Sociology / Politics Gender Studies / Sexuality Photography Collage / Mail Art / Xerox Art Fluxus Film / Video

S.C.U.M Manifesto
by Valerie Solanas

1968, English
Softcover, 112 pages, 18 x 11 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by Olympia Press / New York

$780.00 - In stock -

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Very rare 1st Olympia Press edition of S.C.U.M by Valerie Solanas, published in New York shortly after her arrest for the shooting of Andy Warhol.

"Warhol...the ultimate voyeur...felled by S.C.U.M...."–Time

S.C.U.M Manifesto is a legendary radical feminist manifesto by Valerie Solanas, a searing indictment of patriarchal culture in all its forms first published in 1967 as a mimeographed edition of 2,000 copies. It argues that men have ruined the world, and that it is up to women to fix it. To achieve this goal, it suggests the formation of S.C.U.M, an organization dedicated to overthrowing society and eliminating the male sex. The Manifesto was little-known until Solanas attempted to murder Andy Warhol by shooting him at The Factory in 1968. This event brought significant public attention to the Manifesto and Solanas herself.

Published by the legendary French publisher Maurice Girodias’ Olympia Press, with a foreword by Girodias, and a commentary by Paul Krassner.

VG copy with no spine creases, well–bound, light wear to board extremities, toned pulp pages. An uncommonly well preserved copy.

File under: Valerie Solanas Paul Krassner Maurice Girodias Olympia Press / New York Feminism Out-of-print / Rare Theory / Essay Sociology / Politics

Bakunin on Anarchy
by Mikhail Bakunin

1972, English
Hardcover (w. dust jacket), 405 pages, 24 x 16.5 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by George Allen / London

$110.00 - Out of stock

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Rare first British hardcover edition of Bakunin on Anarchy, a new selection of writings nearly all published for the first time in English by the founder of the world Anarchist movement, published by George Allen & Unwin, London, 1972.

"This is the first comprehensive collection in English from the works of the founder of anarchism—culled and newly translated from Bakunin's writings, published and unpublished—including manuscripts left unfinished or unrevised at the time of his death almost a century ago."

Very Good copy in VG dust jacket. Mild wear to jacket extremities, closed tears. Preserved in mylar wrap.

File under: Mikhail Bakunin George Allen / London Anarchism Sociology / Politics Out-of-print / Rare Philosophy Theory / Essay Socialism / Communism / Capitalism

David Medalla
Parables of Friendship

2022, English / German
Softcover, 272 pages, 33 x 22 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by Museion / Bolzano Bonner Kunstverein / Bonn Walther König / Köln

$60.00 - In stock -

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This volume accompanies a major survey of work by Filipino artist, political activist and and pioneer of kinetic art David Medalla (1938–2020). The publication brings together previous unpublished writings of Medalla, interviews with the artists, alongside contributions by writers and academics including Purissima Benitez-Johannot, Eva Bentheva, Gavin Jantjets, David Morris, Rasheed Araeen, amongst others along with visual material from the Medalla archives, the archive of art historian Guy Brett and David Medalla.

Curated by Steven Cairns and Fatima Hellberg and presented by Museion together with the Bonner Kunstverein, and in close collaboration with the David Medalla Archive in Berlin, Parables of Friendship recounts the vital legacy, spirit, energy and radical nature of the artist’s work. Drawings, paintings, collages, sculptures, neon, kinetic and participatory artworks, and performances produced in a career spanning over seventy years.

Medalla’s work, characterized by an unbridled freedom of expression, explores the possibilities of exchange and intersection between art and life, mixing major contemporary themes such as ecology, cultural identity, sexuality and work ethics, with no concern whatsoever for the compartmentalisation that society imposes. A dandy and traveler, after arriving in Marseille from Manila, in the 1960s Medalla lived in London, Paris, Venice, Berlin, New York and Manila, including his experiences of travel and transition in his work, that is often ephemeral, transient and made from found materials, that further indicate the free spirit of his art.

Strongly influenced by 19th and 20th century European art and literature, and an active figure in Swinging London, Medalla was instrumental in the brief but pioneering experience of London’s Signals Gallery (1962-64), the experimental performance collective, The Exploding Galaxy (1967-68) and the politically engaged, Artists for Democracy, of which he was president (1974-1977). In collaboration with the artist Adam Nankervis (1994) he founded The Mondrian Fan Club and the London Biennale (2000), where processes of collaboration and exchange continued to take center stage.

As the title suggests, Parables of Friendship comprises both social engagement and transcendence, the two main characteristics of Medalla’s art. The diversity of his tireless production and his continuous search for connections reveal a search for the “oneness of the whole” through differences, and a deeply experiential and sentimental relationship with being. His work reflects paradoxes and traumas that are part of cultural identity, an identity that for him remains a multi-temporal and multi-directional process.

Editors: Steven Cairns, Fatima Hellberg and Bart van der Heide.

VG copy, light wear.

File under: David Medalla Steven Cairns Fatima Hellberg Bart van der Heide David Medalla Purissima Benitez-Johannot Eva Bentheva Gavin Jantjets David Morris Rasheed Araeen Museion / Bolzano Bonner Kunstverein / Bonn Walther König / Köln Art Sociology / Politics Collage / Mail Art / Xerox Art Painting Drawing Out-of-print / Rare

The Shadow of Enlightenment: Optical and Political Transparency in France 1789-1848
by Theresa Levitt

2009, English
Hardcover (w. dust jacket), 192 pages, 24 x 16 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by Oxford University Press / UK

$45.00 - In stock -

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First 2009 HC edition.

This book is the first to place revolutionary advances in light and optics in the cultural context of France in the first half of the nineteenth century. The narrative follows the work and careers of France's two chief rivals on the subject of light: Arago and Biot. Their disagreement began on the subject of technical optics, but expanded to include politics, religion, agricultural policy, education, dinner companions, housing arrangements, photography, railroads, vital forces, astrology, the Egyptian calendar, and colonial slavery. At the heart of their disagreement was always a question of visibility, and the extent of transparency or obscurity they assigned to the world. Optical transparency formed a crucial condition for Arago's vision of a liberal republic governed by reason. Biot's call for strong forms of authority rested on his claims that the world did not offer itself up for universal agreement so easily.

VG copy in VG DJ.

File under: Theresa Levitt François Arago Jean-Baptiste Biot Oxford University Press / UK Theory / Essay Sociology / Politics Sound / Music Out-of-print / Rare Photography

The Divine Mimesis
by Pier Paolo Pasolini

2014, English
Softcover, 106 pages, 20.32 x 12.7 cm
Published by Contra Mundum Press / New York

$34.00 - In stock -

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Written between 1963 and 1967, The Divine Mimesis, Pasolini's imitation of the early cantos of the Inferno, offers a searing critique of Italian society and the intelligentsia of the 1960s. It is also a self-critique by the author of The Ashes of Gramsci (1957) who saw the civic world evoked by that book fading absolutely from view.

By the mid-1960s, Pasolini theorized, the Italian language had sacrificed its connotative expressiveness for the sake of a denuded technological language of pure communication. In this context, he projects a 'rewrite' of Dante's Commedia in which two historical embodiments of Pasolini himself occupy the roles of the pilgrim and guide in their underworld journey. Densely layered with poetic and philological allusions, and illuminated by a parallel text of photographs that juxtapose the world of the Italian literati to the simple reality of rural Italian life, this narrative was curtailed by Pasolini several years before he sent it to his publisher, a few months prior to his murder in 1975. Yet, many of Pasolini's projects took the provisional form of "Notes toward..." an eventual work, such as Sopralluoghi in Palestina (Location Scouting in Palestine), Appunti per una Oresteiade africana (Notes for an African Oresteia), and Appunti per un film sull'India (Notes for a Film on India). The Divine Mimesis has a kinship to these filmic works as Pasolini himself ruled it 'complete' though still in a partial form. Written at a turning point in his life when he was wrestling with his poetic 'demons, ' the true center of gravity of Pasolini's Dantean project is the potential of poetry to teach and probe, ethically and aesthetically, in reality. "I wanted to make something seething and magmatic," Pasolini declared, "even if in prose."

In this first English translation of Pasolini's La divina mimesis, Italianist Thomas E. Peterson offers historical, linguistic, and cultural analyses that aim to expand the discourse about an enigmatic author considered by many to be the greatest Italian poet after Montale. Published by Contra Mundum Press one year in advance of the 40th anniversary of Pasolini's death.

In the history of twentieth-century poetry, there is no other poet besides Pasolini who has more tenaciously interrogated his own 'I, ' more persistently contemplated it, admired it, examined it, analyzed it and dissected it in order then to show its suffering entrails to the world, as they beg for understanding, affection, and pity. - Giorgio B rberi Squarotti *

File under: Pier Paolo Pasolini Thomas E. Peterson Pier Paolo Pasolini Contra Mundum Press / New York Film / Video Sociology / Politics Socialism / Communism / Capitalism

Stories, Tales, and Fables
by Marquis de Sade

2025, English
Softcover, 656 pages, 20.3 x 12.7 cm
Published by Contra Mundum Press / New York

$68.00 - In stock -

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“It is said I present vice as too odious. The reason: I do not want people to be attracted to vice. I am far more moral than those who make their villains attractive. I shall only ever depict crime in the most vivid colours of hell. I want readers to see crime in all its vile nakedness, to fear it and to hate it, and so I show it in all its horror. Woe to those who dress crime in roses! Their intentions are impure, and I will never imitate them.”—The Marquis de Sade

Written in his Bastille cell in the years between 120 Days of Sodom and Justine, this is the first English translation of Marquis de Sade’s collection of short works, Stories, Tales, and Fables.

Essential reading for all Sade devotees, Stories, Tales, and Fables is an introduction for those who are not yet familiar with the work of this controversial French literary innovator. The short works in this collection range from the dramatic novella, Dorci, to comic tales such as The Duped Judge. Whether he is writing bawdy, exuberant comedies, supernatural tales, or human tragedies, Sade is essentially a moralist, and his exploration of the darker side of human nature remains as relevant to our society as it was to his own.

Psychologically perceptive and defiantly unconventional, Stories, Tales, and Fables reveals the compelling force of Sade’s narrative powers. An accomplished and artful fiction writer, Sade, like all great writers, asks penetrating questions about society, life, and humanity. This collection also includes a selection of Sade’s non-fiction, ranging from his insightful survey of the novelist's art, Some Thoughts on the Novel, to his Last Will and Testament, as well as several essays about Sade’s work by renowned authors including Apollinaire, Heine, Masson, Anatole France and Paul Ėluard.

Translated by R.J. Dent

File under: Marquis de Sade The Marquis de Sade Guillaume Apollinaire Andre Breton André Breton Paul Eluard Heinrich Heine Anatole France R.J. Dent Contra Mundum Press / New York Transgressive / Visceral / Abject Sociology / Politics Eros Fetishism / BDSM Fiction / Poetry Theory / Essay Philosophy

The Testament (& Other Texts)
by Rainer Maria Rilke

2025, English
Softcover, 202 pages,‎ 20.4 x 12.7 cm
Published by Contra Mundum Press / New York

$48.00 - In stock -

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WORLD PREMIERE ENGLISH TRANSLATION

Rilke’s Testament opens with the outbreak of WWI, a devastating world event that prevents the poet from returning to the “incomparable city of Paris,” and which is entwined with his own debilitating crises.

In this decisive period, before which recovery or death waits, Rilke undergoes a kind of auto-da-fé and gives us a record of his failure and achievement. With insights into what he called his peculiar fate, the poet forges a will and testament, which he says “will remain his last, even if his heart still faced many years of challenges ahead.” Is this the final word on his struggle between love in life and love transformed into the mosaic of art?

Written while suffering an impasse with the Duino Elegies and just before he and Merline Klossowska discover the Chateau de Muzot, which would become a fertile sanctuary for the nomadic poet, Rilke turns to translation as a pontifex to carry him through the muteness of his crises. Having at last opened some free associative realm, he begins sketching terse reflections, lyrical draft letters, and dense, wistful prose, fragmentary writings that speak to the powers of destruction and creation.

Long secret, this enigmatic and charged series of experimental texts is the record of the close of a remarkable winter, wherein the work of poetry, the artist’s struggle with life, is tested in the crucible of solitude and the sinister expanse of blank pages. An illuminating ars poetica, Rilke’s Testament constitutes the mortal risk of not going beyond love, and the risk of the potential death of the artist, where the silencing of the logos puts creative potency under threat.

This world premiere English translation also includes essays on politics, poetry, sound, the sacred and sexuality, and the complete poem sequence “From the Literary Estate of Count C.W.," all works dating from the 'testament years.' The Testament (& Other Texts) documents a creative interregnum and is the dark passageway between the Duino Elegies and The Sonnets to Orpheus.

Edited by Rainer J. Hanshe
Translated with an introduction by Mark Kanak

File under: Rainer Maria Rilke Mark Kanak Rainer J. Hanshe Contra Mundum Press / New York Fiction / Poetry Poetry Theory / Essay Literary Theory / Semiotics / Language Sociology / Politics

An Archive
by Mathieu Lindon

2026, English
Softcover, 208 pages, 20.4 x 13.7 cm
Published by Semiotext(e) / Los Angeles

$34.00 - In stock -

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Translated by Bruce Benderson

I wanted to tell the story of Les Éditions de Minuit as I saw them as a child. And also to tell the story of my father, Jérôme Lindon, as I saw him and loved him. Are there archives for that? And how to be an archive of the child that I once was?

An Archive tells the story of Les Éditions de Minuit, the legendary Parisian publisher of Samuel Beckett, Marguerite Duras, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Claude Simon, Monique Wittig, Gilles Deleuze, Pierre Bourdieu, Marie NDiaye, and so many others. It is the tale of its editor, Jérôme Lindon, who directed the publishing house from 1948 until his death in 2001. It is also the chronicle of growing up in a family of writers who were, to the eyes of a young child, the temple of literature. Looking back on a childhood immersed in books, Mathieu Lindon draws a portrait of his father, narrating his use of power and his avarice, but also his generosity, his enthusiasm for literature and defense of authors, and his commitment to politics—during the German Occupation, through the Algerian War of Independence, and for the Palestinian cause after the Arab-Israeli War of 1967. Opening the archive of his own memory, Lindon gives a moving, ferocious, and often funny account of a defining period of twentieth-century French intellectual history.

"An Archive evades all generic definition. A singular text, captivating and infinitely poignant, it assembles and explores what has always been the strength of Mathieu Lindon's work: intimacy narrated with perfect pitch, openly stating what was without straying from a reserve which is also respect."–Christine Marcandier, Diacritik

"An exercise in a love that is not blind, a practice of boundless admiration, An Archive is a magnificent literary tombstone."–Nelly Kaprièlian, Les Inrockuptibles

Mathieu Lindon was born in 1955. He is a columnist for Liberation and the author of numerous books, including Learning What Love Means and Hervelino, both published in English by Semiotext(e).

File under: Mathieu Lindon Bruce Benderson Semiotext(e) / Los Angeles Literary Theory / Semiotics / Language Theory / Essay Sociology / Politics Philosophy Psychoanalysis

Powers of Reading: From Plato to Audiobooks
by Peter Szendy

2025, English
Softcover,‎ 208 pages, 22.86 x 15.24 cm
Published by Zone Books / New York

$45.00 - Out of stock

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Translated by Olivia Custer

“Peter Szendy offers a subtle, persuasive, and unprecedented account of the time of reading and its scene of address, one that is as archaic as it is contemporary. When we read, are we listening to a voice or being read to? If it is not a private and monologic exercise, how do we understand the populated scene of reading? What reads when we read, and how does reading push and pull between temporalities and voices? Why do we keep leaving the text when we seek to obey the injunction to stay within its terms?

Questions such as these produce a fresh, even startling, consideration of a wide range of literary and popular texts, including Hobbes’ Leviathan, Flaubert’s Madame Bovary, Kant’s moral injunctions, Sade, Valéry, Blanchot, and de Certeau, but also modern fiction, film, audiobooks, and hypertext. The power of reading turns out to belong to its surprising engagement with time and direction: the deliberate reader stays close but strays, tries to fill in the gaps but gets pushed back by a countercurrent. The key to the text is sought ‘outside’ only to be led back to the text and its failure to deliver a final answer. Equally at odds with older versions of literary formalism that insist on the self-referentiality of the text as well as contextualists who scour an external social order to discover the truth of the text, Szendy approaches that very conflict as an oscillation constitutive of reading itself. Paradoxically, reading is sustained precisely by what interrupts its teleological flow.

The result is a comic, profound, and timely reconceptualization of reading which rushes forward only to find itself pushed back into the heart of the text, which discovers that this incessant breaking from the text, this headlong rushing ahead to the world outside the text is a sequence of overreach, delay, and return that forms the ragged rhythm of reading itself. Powers of Reading is a patient, brilliant, and illuminating inquiry into the crosscurrents of voice and address, one that speaks to the speed and complexity of our time, how we are upended by our forward propulsions, to consider how multiple voice, action, and passivity are all rearranged in the scene of reading.”— Judith Butler, Distinguished Professor in the Graduate School, University of California, Berkeley

“Szendy offers us one of the most acute political philosophies of reading of our time.” —Catherine Malabou
“What was—and is—reading? Ranging from a playful analysis of what it feels like to be read to, to an erudite account of judicial systems that alternately censor books and condemn readers to read them, to a revelatory reconstruction of the role of the slave in Plato’s dialogues, this elegant series of essays uses a wide range of literary and philosophical texts to launch an inquiry into the philosophical stakes of an everyday practice.” — Leah Price, Henry Rutgers Distinguished Professor, Rutgers University

“Szendy offers us one of the most acute political philosophies of reading of our time. Reading inverts the Hegelian dialectical process of freedom, to the extent that there exists, in each reader, a slave who commands and a master who obeys. Literacy coincides with the birth of an inner voice that, even if whispering and always on the verge of disappearing, forces us to decipher, making it impossible to say what we didn’t know. From Plato to Sade, from neurology to hermeneutics, the law of reading appears as what it is: the inescapable burden of responsibility.” — Catherine Malabou, Professor of Comparative Literature and European Languages and Studies, University of California, Irvine

File under: Peter Szendy Zone Books / New York Theory / Essay Philosophy Literary Theory / Semiotics / Language Sociology / Politics Renaissance / Neoclassicism / Romanticism

Atlas Anthology 3
Edited by Alastair Brotchie & Malcolm Green

1985, English
Softcover (w. paste-ins), 224 pages, 21 x 15 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by Atlas Press / London

$100.00 - Out of stock

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"A chrestomathy of dicey enchantments.'—CITY LIMITS

Now rare, long out-of-print 1985 Atlas Anthology 3, edited by Alastair Brotchie & Malcolm Green. "Benign Pollution, Enthused Writing". The third production from the legendary Atlas Press, the third general anthology and the first book to be actually typeset (a very expensive business in those days).

Features: Hans Carl Artmann, Pierre Albert-Birot, Wolfgang Bauer, Konrad Bayer, Pierre Bettencourt, Peter Blegvad, Andre Breton, Jean-Pierre Brisset, Günter Brus, René Crevel, David Gascoyne, Alfred Jarry, James Kirkup, Karl Kraus, Jean Lorrain, Harry Mathews, Gustave Meyrink, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Georges Perec, Benjamin Peret, Oskar Panizza, Raymond Queneau, Jacques Rigaut, Herbert Rosendorfer, Raymond Roussel, Paul Scheerbart, Mathew Phipps Shiel, Kurt Schwitters, Boris Vian, Austryn Wainhouse, Robert Walser, Unica Zürn, Etcetera Etc.

"Here is a prose based on Romanticism, in this century focused around the early Expressionism and the Surrealist movement. It is a literature of unusual beauty and bitter humour, political (in the widest sense), it asserts a complete freedom of form and content. Neither 'cool', restrained nor boring! An important collection of unjustly neglected authors, past and present, which includes many who are seldom translated into English."

Highest recommendation.
Good—Very Good copy complete with all the paste-ins. General wear and tanning.

File under: Peter Blegvad Kurt Schwitters Günter Brus Pier Paolo Pasolini Unica Zürn Alastair Brotchie Malcolm Green Hans Carl Artmann Pierre Albert-Birot Wolfgang Bauer Konrad Bayer Andre Breton André Breton Unica Zürn Pierre Bettencourt Peter Blegvad Günter Brus René Crevel Jean-Pierre Brisset David Gascoyne Alfred Jarry James Kirkup Karl Kraus Jean Lorrain Robert Walser Georges Perec Benjamin Péret Gustave Meyrink Harry Mathews Raymond Queneau Jacques Rigaut Raymond Roussel Paul Scheerbart Boris Vian Oskar Panizza Herbert Rosendorfer Mathew Phipps Shiel Kurt Schwitters Austryn Wainhouse Atlas Press / London Dada Renaissance / Neoclassicism / Romanticism Symbolism / Decadence / Fin de siècle Surrealism Out-of-print / Rare Fiction / Poetry Art Concrete Poetry Poetry Philosophy Situationism / Lettrism Sociology / Politics Theory / Essay Weird / Speculative / Science Fiction

The Tears of Eros
by Georges Bataille

1989, English
Softcover, 213 pages, 20.5 x 18 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by City Lights Books / San Francisco

$120.00 - Out of stock

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First 1989 City Lights English translation, long out-of-print.

Tears of Eros is the culmination of Georges Bataille's inquiries into the relationship between violence and the sacred. Taking up such figures as Giles de Rais, Erzebet Bathory, the Marquis de Sade, El Greco, Gustave Moreau, Andre Breton, Voodoo practitioners, and Chinese torture victims, Bataille reveals their common death. This essay, illustrated with artwork from every era, was developed out of ideas explored in Death and Sexuality and Prehistoric Lascaux or the Birth of Art . In it Bataille examines death—the "little death" that follows sexual climax, the proximate death in sadomasochistic practices, and death as part of religious ritual and sacrifice. "Bataille is one of the most important writers of the century."— Michel Foucault Georges Bataille was born in Billom, France, in 1897. He was a librarian by profession. Also a philosopher, novelist, and critic he was founder of the College of Sociology. In 1959, Bataille began Tears of Eros , and it was completed in 1961, his final work. City Lights published two of his other Story of the Eye and The Impossible . Bataille died in 1962.

French essayist, philosophical theorist, and novelist, often called the "metaphysician of evil." Bataille was interested in sex, death, degradation, and the power and potential of the obscene. He rejected traditional literature and considered that the ultimate aim of all intellectual, artistic, or religious activity should be the annihilation of the rational individual in a violent, transcendental act of communion. Roland Barthes, Julia Kristeva, and Philippe Sollers have all written enthusiastically about his work.

Very Good copy, light wear to extremities/corners.

File under: Georges Bataille City Lights Books / San Francisco Surrealism Occult / Esoterica Eros Fetishism / BDSM Transgressive / Visceral / Abject Theory / Essay Philosophy Sociology / Politics Out-of-print / Rare Art

Le Sang et La Rose No. 3, 1969

1969, Japanese / French
Softcover, 232 pages, 23 x 18 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by Tensei Shuppan / Tokyo

$110.00 - In stock -

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Revue de Érotologie, Homosexualité, Sadisme, Masochisme, Fétischisme, Narcissime, Infantilisme, Magie, Occultisme, Humour Noir, Complexe Psychisme. What more could you ask for? Le Sang Et La Rose is a masterpiece of the Japanese underground. A groundbreaking, powerful, yet short-lived Japanese arts and literary journal published in Tokyo from late 1968—mid 1969, published in a total of four luxurious, now collectible, volumes. The first three issues were edited by Tatsuhiko Shibusawa (1928—1987), a legendary, controversial Japanese novelist, art critic, translator of French writers such as Jean Cocteau, Georges Bataille and Marquis de Sade, and specialist in medieval demonology. The importance of this magazine to the Japanese avant-garde and radical culture cannot be overstated.

Born from a period of political, social and economical turmoil in Japan, Le Sang Et La Rose may be understood as a emblematic distillation and product of the late ‘60s student rebellion and anti-authoritarian underground culture. Wilfully politically subversive, the publication drew upon a vast range of perspectives - from criticism, literature, obscure esoteric sciences, art, eroticism, radical avant-garde and a historical-rooted Japanese counterculture; featuring literature, theory, art, photography, illustration and graphic design from the most innovative and subversive Japanese and international (predominately French) artists, authors and critics, spanning the themes above. As instigator, Tatsuhiko Shibusawa in effect formulated the magazine’s design to be a spiritual and political operative that would weaponize its readers minds. This stance was made clear in the 1969 manifesto text — "My 1969" — in which Shibusawa discuss' how he perceived the ‘60s as being the age of ideas, ideas as weapons, and outlined a distain towards systems of power, moralism, State oppression, sanitised and harmless liberalism, dogmatic academic sciences and an outright distrust for ideological, progressive literary scholars who advocate "freedom of expression", but have never caused friction with the judicial power. The magazine sketched out an aim to push towards a new kind of personal freedom, intellect, autonomy and moral compass. Here, the concept of ‘erotism’ — as discussed by Georges Bataille in his highly influential 1957 book "Erotism: Death and Sensuality" — acts as a critical force. 

Issue no. 3 (with cover by Bronzino, 1554) includes full-colour photographic feature by Kishin Shinoyama ("Virgin In Uniform" featuring models/artists Angela Asaoka, Akaji Maro, Yoko Ashikawa) and beautiful Shomei Tomatsu photo feature ("Scoptophilia"), the artwork of the great French cross-dressing painter-photographer Pierre Molinier, texts by Jirō Kawamura, Yumiko Kurahashi, Taruho Inagaki ("Memories of Hemorrhoids or "New Tsurezuregusa"), Akiyuki Nosaka ("Dear Penis, Goodbye"), Minoru Minamihara ("The Mystic Thought of Love in the Case of Jakob Böhme"), Takiji Kobayashi, The Fictitious Garden of Babylon by Tatsuhiko Shibusawa, Tsunekazu Murata ("Witch's Ax : Concerning Heresy in Medieval Europe"), translation of Franz Kafka "Metamorphosis" illustrated by Franco Gentilini, recent research on homosexuality by film critic Jin'ichi Uekusa, Kama Sutra, more Gay (Danshoku) Japanese Theater history, Marquise de Blancvilliers by Koji Nakata, and much more.

Tatsuhiko Shibusawa (1928—1987), was a well-known and controversial Japanese novelist, art critic, and translator of French writers such as Jean Cocteau, Georges Bataille and Marquis de Sade. In 1960 he and his publisher, Kyōji Ishii, were trialled for public obscenity over the publishing of Shibusawa's translation of de Sade's Juliette into the Japanese language. What was to be known as the "Sade Trial" took 9 years and although many of Japan's leading authors testified for the defense, in 1969 the Japanese Supreme Court ruled them guilty and charged. This did not deter Shibusawa, whose essays on black magic, demonology and eroticism were popular reading in Japan, and in 1981 he was awarded the 9th Izumi Kyoka Literature Prize.

Very Good copy. Light general tanning/wear.

File under: Kishin Shinoyama Shomei Tomatsu Pierre Molinier Franco Gentilini Yokoo Tadanori Angela Asaoka Akaji Maro Yoko Ashikawa Tatsuhiko Shibusawa Franz Kafka Yukio Mishima Taruho Inagaki Jun’nosuke Yoshiyuki Kôichi Iijima Jûrô Kara Ikuya Kato Minoru Yoshioka Ryûichi Tamura The Marquis de Sade Georges Bataille Andre Pieyre De Mandiargues Jirō Kawamura Yumiko Kurahashi Akiyuki Nosaka Minoru Minamihara Jakob Böhme Takiji Kobayashi Tsunekazu Murata Jin'ichi Uekusa Tensei Shuppan / Tokyo Ero Guro / Erotic / Grotesque Transgressive / Visceral / Abject Eros Fetishism / BDSM Out-of-print / Rare Periodicals Japanese Photography Surrealism Philosophy Theory / Essay Fiction / Poetry Symbolism / Decadence / Fin de siècle Ancient / Medieval / Gothic Art Counterculture Illustration / Graphic Art / Bandes Dessinées LGBTQ+ Occult / Esoterica Photography Sociology / Politics

Plexus 30
December 1969

1969, French
Softcover, 130 pages, 20 x 17.8 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / very good
Published by Planète / Paris

$40.00 - In stock -

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Issue 30 of Plexus, an avant-garde French magazine published in Paris from 1966-1970, created as the companion publication to fantastical realist magazine Planète by prominent figures French journalist and author Louis Pauwels and fantastique fiction author Jacques Sternberg. Born from the ashes of surrealism into it's cultivated counterculture and subtitled "the uninhibited magazine", Plexus blended a psychedelic mix of erotica, fantasy, philosophy, psychedelia, literature, esoterica, filmmaking, science fiction, satirical cartoons and more. Only 37 issues total were published during its short four year run, but it made a big splash, even being prohibited to minors in 1967 after just one year of publication for its “pornographic content.” Each issue featured striking cover artwork by some of the most prominent artists of the period, along with galleries of erotic artworks, historical and contemporary – often seen only in the pages of Plexus.

Plexus, issue 30, December 1969. Cover by Bonneville. Features a gallery of art by Max Savy, the first ever pornography fair in Copenhagen, Contemporary art and the sexual revolution (Niki de Saint Phalle, Mel Ramos, Alina Szapocznikow, Martial Raysse, Roy Lichtenstein, Christo, Tom Wesselmann, Yves Klein, David Hockney, Richard Lindner, Bernard Rancillac, James Rosenquist, Larry Rivers, etc. by Pierre Restany, French author Catherine de Prémonville, Edgar Morin, and so much more.

VG copy, light wear/age.

File under: Catherine de Prémonville Edgar Morin Max Savy Alina Szapocznikow Niki de Saint Phalle Martial Raysse Christo Yves Klein David Hockney Richard Lindner James Rosenquist Larry Rivers Roy Lichtenstein Tom Wesselmann Pierre Restany Jacques Sternberg Catherine de Prémonville Edgar Morin Planète / Paris Periodicals Out-of-print / Rare Eros Counterculture Drugs / Psychedelia Weird / Speculative / Science Fiction Art Brut / Folk / Visionary / Fantastic Art Illustration / Graphic Art / Bandes Dessinées Film / Video Photography Occult / Esoterica Philosophy Sociology / Politics Nouveau Réalisme / Zero / Kinetic Pop Art

Plexus 24
May 1969

1969, French
Softcover, 162 pages, 20 x 17.8 cm
Published by Planète / Paris

$35.00 - In stock -

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Issue 24 of Plexus, an avant-garde French magazine published in Paris from 1966-1970, created as the companion publication to fantastical realist magazine Planète by prominent figures French journalist and author Louis Pauwels and fantastique fiction author Jacques Sternberg. Born from the ashes of surrealism into it's cultivated counterculture and subtitled "the uninhibited magazine", Plexus blended a psychedelic mix of erotica, fantasy, philosophy, psychedelia, literature, esoterica, filmmaking, science fiction, satirical cartoons and more. Only 37 issues total were published during its short four year run, but it made a big splash, even being prohibited to minors in 1967 after just one year of publication for its “pornographic content.” Each issue featured striking cover artwork by some of the most prominent artists of the period, along with galleries of erotic artworks, historical and contemporary – often seen only in the pages of Plexus.

Plexus, issue 24, May 1969. Cover by Pierre Le Colas. Features a gallery of art by Pierre Le Colas, Modesto Roldan, Ivan Steiger, photography by Jean Clemmer, Piero Fornasetti, Roger Caillois, Robert Sheckley,
and so much more.

VG copy, light wear/age.

File under: Pierre Le Colas Modesto Roldan Ivan Steiger Piero Fornasetti Jean Clemmer Jacques Sternberg Planète / Paris Periodicals Out-of-print / Rare Art Illustration / Graphic Art / Bandes Dessinées Art Brut / Folk / Visionary / Fantastic Eros Sociology / Politics Collage / Mail Art / Xerox Art Occult / Esoterica Counterculture Photography Weird / Speculative / Science Fiction

Selected Writings on Anarchism and Revolution
by Peter Kropotkin

1970, English
Softcover, 374 pages, 21 x 13 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by The MIT Press / Massachusetts

$50.00 - In stock -

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Scarce first 1970 edition of Kropotkin's Selected Writings on Anarchism and Revolution, published by the MIT Press, edited with an introduction by Martin A. Miller.

The selection of this anthology is designed to reveal such fundamental conceptions as Kropotkin's interpretation of the role of anarchism in modern history, his criticism of capitalism, his theory of revolution, and his views of the ideals to be realized in the postrevolutionary society of the future.

The editor of this anthology writes that anarchism in the late nineteenth century combined within itself the extremes of intellectuals such as Kropotkin and Tolstoy surrounded by an aura of unimpeachable moral conduct, together with assassins and bandit-outlaws such as Ravachol and Sazonov. What these widely disparate individuals shared was a common attitude toward society and the state. It was an attitude of profound alienation cutting across all social class lines from urban aristocrat to rural peasant.

This anthology contains selected essays and correspondence of Peter Alekseevich Kropotkin, who was, after Bakunin's death in 1876, unquestionably the most widely read and respected theorist of anarchism. The selection is designed to reveal such fundamental conceptions as Kropotkin's interpretation of the role of anarchism in modern history, his criticism of capitalism, his theory of revolution, and his views of the ideals to be realized in the postrevolutionary society of the future. The theoretical writings are supplemented by more concrete articles dealing specifically with conditions in nineteenth-century Russia--a society confronted by an authentic revolutionary opposition. Kropotkin's analysis of the revolution itself is implicit in the report of his meeting with Lenin and in his letters to the Bolshevik leader. The letters to Nettlau, Steffen, and Brandes present additional concerns which are closely related to the large themes of anarchism and revolution described in the essays.

Martin Miller's introduction surveys and analyzes the most significant aspects of Kropotkin's life and thought: Kropotkin's formative years in Russia, 1842-1876, and the origins of his anarchist thinking (military service in eastern Siberia, the influence of the works of Proudhon and Bakunin, his role in the Chaikovskii Circle); his years as an emigre in western Europe, 1976-1917, and the ripening of his political thought (editor of Le Révolté, his views on propaganda by the deed and on Marxist socialism); and his last years in the Soviet Union, 1917-1921 (the revolution and civil war, his meeting and correspondence with Lenin).

Good copy with general age wear. Previous owners name.

File under: Peter Kropotkin Martin A. Miller Pyotr Kropotkin The MIT Press / Massachusetts Anarchism Out-of-print / Rare Sociology / Politics Theory / Essay Socialism / Communism / Capitalism

The Anarchist Prince: A Biographical Study of Peter Kropotkin
by George Woodcock & Ivan Avakumovic

1971, English
Softcover, 465 pages, 20.5 x 13.5 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by Schocken Books / New York

$50.00 - In stock -

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"In the famous eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, "anarchism" is defined as "the name given to the principle or theory of life and conduct under which society is conceived without government." To write the article on this subject, which customarily evoked lurid images of chaos in the public mind, the editors wisely chose. Peter Alexeivich Kropotkin, the noblest and best of all the anarchists that ever were.

Born in 1842 into an ancient military family of Russian princes, Peter Kropotkin was selected as a child for the elite Corps of Pages by Tsar Nicholas I himself. Shortly before his death in 1921, he had moved so far from his aristocratic beginnings and attained such stature as a libertarian leader that he could write with impunity to Lenin, "Vladimir Ilyich, your concrete actions are completely unworthy of the ideas you pretend to hold."

THE ANARCHIST PRINCE details the life that flowed between these two points in time-Kropotkin's rejection of an army career, his awakening to anarchist principles, his arrest and daring escape from Russia to the West, his impressive scientific achievements, his exile in England, and, most of all, his unfailing devotion to humanity.
The recent works of George Woodcock, a well-known Canadian author, include Anarchism, The British in the Far East, and biographies of Godwin and Proudhon. Ivan Avakumovic is Professor of History at the University of British Columbia and the author of History of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia (Vol. I, 1964)."

Good copy, general wear covers, spine, page toning.

File under: Peter Kropotkin George Woodcock Ivan Avakumovic Schocken Books / New York Anarchism Socialism / Communism / Capitalism Out-of-print / Rare Sociology / Politics Theory / Essay

Thinking Gaza: An Essay on Ferocity
by Franco Bifo Berardi

2026, English
Softcover, 176 pages, 17.7 x 11.6 cm
Published by Semiotext(e) / Los Angeles

$35.00 - In stock -

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A call to imagine a less deadly future, written in the shadow of genocide and "ferocious optimism."

After Gaza, it is time to recognize that the attempt to humanize history has failed, and that there will not be a second try. It is time to recognize that the experiment called "civilization" has failed... The abyss is wide open and we cannot help but see it. We must gaze into the abyss, we must gauge the breadth and depth of the abyss. We must draw a map of the abyss, while precipitously falling into it.

"Thinking after Gaza" means recognizing the collapse of universal reason and democracy, the humanistic values that were the famed—and fragile—promise of modernity. But it also means searching for ways to escape the grim future awaiting those born in this disenchanted century: this century that promises to be the last, in which thought has lost all political power and the survival instinct struggles to withstand the ferocity of techno-military extermination machines. To the generation born in the twilight of Western civilization, we owe this last act of thinking, so as to imagine the desertion of our barbaric present, along pathways that have yet to be illuminated.

The latest essay by renowned Italian autonomist theorist Franco "Bifo" Berardi, Thinking After Gaza is a reflection on the multivalent consequences—political, philosophical, civilizational—of the current genocide in Gaza and the West Bank. Bearing sober witness to the conditions on the ground in the Occupied Territories, while tracking the "ferocious optimism" that has replaced Enlightenment ideals, this book is addressed not only to activists but also to pacifist philosophers, historians, and theologians.

File under: Franco 'Bifo' Berardi Franco Berardi Semiotext(e) / Los Angeles Sociology / Politics Theory / Essay Protest / Revolt Crime / Violence Philosophy

The Conspiracy of Art: Manifestos, Interviews, Essays
by Jean Baudrillard

2005, English
Softcover, 248 pages, 22.86 x 15.2 cm
Published by Semiotext(e) / Los Angeles

$36.00 - In stock -

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Cutting-edge theorist Jean Baudrillard on the complicitous dance of art, politics, economics, and media; includes "War Porn," on Abu Ghraib as a new genre of reality TV.

The images from Abu Ghraib are as murderous for America as those of the World Trade Center in flames. The whole West is contained in the burst of sadistic laughter of the American soldiers, as it is behind the construction of the Israeli wall. This is where the truth of these images lies. Truth, but not veracity. As virtual as the war itself, their specific violence adds to the specific violence of the war. In The Conspiracy of Art, Baudrillard questions the privilege attached to art by its practitioners. Art has lost all desire for illusion- feeding back endlessly into itself, it has turned its own vanishment into an art unto itself. Far from lamenting the "end of art," Baudrillard celebrates art's new function within the process of insider-trading. Spiraling from aesthetic nullity to commercial frenzy, art has become transaesthetic, like society as a whole.

Conceived and edited by life-long Baudrillard collaborator Sylvère Lotringer, The Conspiracy of Art presents Baudrillard's writings on art in a complicitous dance with politics, economics, and media. Culminating with "War Porn," a scathing analysis of the spectacular images from Abu Ghraib prison as a new genre of reality TV, the book folds back on itself to question the very nature of radical thought.

File under: Jean Baudrillard Jean Baudrillard Sylvère Lotringer Semiotext(e) / Los Angeles Theory / Essay Philosophy Art Sociology / Politics

Tosquelles: Healing Institutions
Edited by Joana Maso

2026, English
Softcover, 344 pages, 25.4 x 17.78 cm
Published by Semiotext(e) / Los Angeles

$46.00 - Out of stock

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A landmark anthology of Francesc Tosquelles's intellectual, clinical, and political writings, many available in English translation for the first time.

Edited by Joana Maso, translated by Robert Hurley and Mara Faye Lethem

Often consigned to legend, the life of Francesc Tosquelles reads as an adventure story of clinical, political, and collective experimentation around healing institutions. Joining the Saint-Alban-sur-Limagnole psychiatric hospital in Nazi-occupied France, Tosquelles invented what would become “institutional psychotherapy” with poets, film critics, photographers, and psychiatrists including Jean Oury, Agnès Masson, Frantz Fanon, Tristan Tzara, and Paul Éluard.

This first anthology of Tosquelles’s writings shines a light on his forgotten history, from his engagement as a psychiatrist during the Spanish Civil War alongside anti-Franquist and anti-Stalinist communists, to his progressive return to Catalonia following his role in the “cultural revolution” of “institutional psychotherapy” in France. Through translations of texts never before available in English, Tosquelles’s powerful voice reminds us how important politicized relations to institutions are in our times of sick institutions, scapegoating of strangers, and globalized war.

File under: Joana Maso Francesc Tosquelles Robert Hurley (Translator) Mara Faye Lethem Semiotext(e) / Los Angeles Psychoanalysis Philosophy / Psychoanalysis Philosophy Socialism / Communism / Capitalism Sociology / Politics Theory / Essay Protest / Revolt

Circuit No. 5
Winter 1968

1968, English
Softcover (staple–bound), 64 pages, 28.5 x 12.2 cm
1st Edition, Out of print title / used / good
Published by Ranelagh Press / Hampstead

$35.00 - In stock -

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Very rare copy of Circuit, issue 5 of only 12, a short–lived British magazine of arts and culture, founded by university students in Cambridge, England, in 1965. With a cover featuring Henry Crowdog of the Brulé Sioux, photographed at the Rosebud Indian Reserve in South Dakota by Ray Carpenter, who is also the designer of the magazine. Circuits stated intent was "to avoid the well-known categories behind which most small magazines shelter, and to aim for a spectrum of ideas, opinions and concerns that are not purely critical, but creative." Articles on Latin American revolutions, painters Francis Bacon and Allen Jones, conference on the Dialectic of Liberation featuring Stokeley Carmichael, Gregory Bateson, Lucien Goldmann, and Ronald Laing, critic George Steiner, interview with Jim Haynes, Jack Moore, and David Medalla of the Arts Laboratory in London, drawings by Polish artist Feliks Topolski and Malcolm Dean, poetry and plays by Spike Hawkins, Peter Ansorge, Raymond Durgnat, David Page, photography by David Bailey, and more.

Good overall copy with dusty/foxed/worn boards, rusted staples, otherwise VG throughout.

File under: Francis Bacon David Bailey Allen Jones Feliks Topolski Spike Hawkins Peter Ansorge Raymond Durgnat David Page Stokeley Carmichael Gregory Bateson Lucien Goldmann Ronald Laing George Steiner Ranelagh Press / Hampstead Counterculture Art Periodicals Out-of-print / Rare Pop Art Painting Eros Fetishism / BDSM Sociology / Politics Socialism / Communism / Capitalism

Let the Record Show: A Political History of ACT UP New York, 1987-1993
by Sarah Schulman

2022, English
Softcover, 752 pages, 21 x 14 cm
Published by St. Martin's Press / New York

$46.00 - Out of stock

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In just six years, ACT UP, New York, a broad and unlikely coalition of activists from all races, genders, sexualities, and backgrounds, changed the world. Armed with rancor, desperation, intelligence, and creativity, it took on the AIDS crisis with an indefatigable, ingenious, and multifaceted attack on the corporations, institutions, governments, and individuals who stood in the way of AIDS treatment for all. They stormed the FDA and NIH in Washington, DC, and started needle exchange programs in New York; they took over Grand Central Terminal and fought to change the legal definition of AIDS to include women; they transformed the American insurance industry, weaponized art and advertising to push their agenda, and battled?and beat?The New York Times, the Catholic Church, and the pharmaceutical industry. Their activism, in its complex and intersectional power, transformed the lives of people with AIDS and the bigoted society that had abandoned them.

Based on more than two hundred interviews with ACT UP members and rich with lessons for today’s activists, Let the Record Show is a revelatory exploration?and long-overdue reassessment?of the coalition’s inner workings, conflicts, achievements, and ultimate fracture. Schulman, one of the most revered queer writers and thinkers of her generation, explores the how and the why, examining, with her characteristic rigor and bite, how a group of desperate outcasts changed America forever, and in the process created a livable future for generations of people across the world.

File under: Sarah Schulman St. Martin's Press / New York LGBTQ+ Protest / Revolt Sociology / Politics Theory / Essay