Raids on Human Consciousness: Writing, Anarchism, and ViolenceHowever one looks at violence -- as an instrument of bureaucracy or ideology; as a product of racial, gender, or class antagonisms; or as the inevitable result of power politics -- it is an integral part of every social system and is one of the most pressing problems of our tortured century. In Raids on Human Consciousness Arthur Redding examines the contention that violence, be it the mass product of revolutionary uprising or a private sadomasochistic indulgence, may be taken to instill in those who commit it the capacity for radical change. Conscious that mainstream theory considers violence deviant, a departure from the normal equilibrium of social and aesthetic structures, while other critiques take it to be integral to any dynamic system, Redding begins with the anarchist inquiry into the relationship of violence to the imaginary representation of modern communities. He explores the "public images" of anarchism in literature and popular culture and emphasizes the diverse strategies by which modern writers encounter, derive, deflect, and manipulate fantasies of political violence. Redding recognizes that language fails when confronted with the extreme suffering of human bodies. Acknowledging that flesh is subject to war, torture, and everyday brutality -- violations to which language can never do justice -- he nonetheless finds it urgent to reclaim language on the far side of suffering. |
From inside the book
Results 1-3 of 37
... James writes to A. C. Benson , “ I have the imagination of disaster - and see life as ferocious and sinister " ( 67 ) . Life is rather ferocious and sinister , for an anarchist . James confesses to a sympathy between himself and his ...
... James and Conrad , in The Secret Agent , 22 " they will manage their trouble with anarchists by adding a third term : woman " ( 6 ) , and " they attempt to manage their crisis in representing anarchism by subordinating the political to ...
... James , yet so too is the proffered revolution- ary solution . There is no better example of this than The Princess Casa- massima , in which the hero is required to throw his ardor into the cause — to replay his own mother's crime , the ...
Contents
Satire Georges Sorel | 30 |
Anarchism and | 71 |
Violence and Modernism | 117 |
Copyright | |
5 other sections not shown
Other editions - View all
Raids on Human Consciousness: Writing, Anarchism, and Violence Arthur F. Redding No preview available - 1998 |