John Zerzan, a respected voice of anarcho-primitivist thought, is back with his call to action to survive and thrive, overcoming our modern crisis.  Instead of viewing the decline of modern civilization as something to mourn, he sees the opportunity for us to reclaim our true humanity. In When We Are Human, Zerzan explores biological and social science discoveries, then invests the abstract findings with history and literature to create a syncretic understanding of how we ended up in a civilization-ending state.  More than his previous works, Zerzan, as an elder in his community, shows us our past errors to ensure a more meaningful future for our next iteration of humanity.

Controversial green anarchist John Zerzan’s latest blast against technology, complete with an introduction by Lang Gore

The infamous eco-anarchist John Zerzan whose books have resulted in recent interviews by Vice and Believer magazines, checks in with further provocative articles about the chaotic results of civilization and technology.

Says novelist Lang Gore in his introduction:

“The present collection of essays continues the overarching thrust of John’s scholarship, unveiling the post-apocalyptic nature of our times by noting the apocalypse was yesterday, several thousand years ago, to be precise, and that nothing produced by civilization can ever redeem the systematic attempt it has undertaken these (very) few millennia to destroy or alienate any human connection with the earth.

“In fact, when civilized Europeans imposed themselves everywhere on Earth, they created a terminal crisis for themselves by their very contact with indigenous societies. Suddenly, those with eyes to see and ears to hear could recognize that patriarchy, property and authority, and certainly slavery, were neither necessary nor desirable, let alone determined by ‘human nature.'”

“The crisis deepens. Everyday life is plundered as much as the physical environment. Our predicament points us toward a solution. The voluntary abandonment of the industrial mode of existence is not self-renunciation, but a healing return.” — from Twilight of the Machines

The mentor of the green anarchist and neo-primitive movements is back with his first book in six years, confronting civilization, mass society, and modernity and technoculture—both the history of its developing crisis and the possibilities for its human and humane solutions.

As John Zerzan writes, “These dire times may yet reveal invigorating new vistas of thought and action. When everything is at stake, all must be confronted and superseded. At this moment, there is the distinct possibility of doing just that.”

John Zerzan can now credibly claim the honor of being America’s most famous anarchist. His writing is sharp, uncompromising, and tenacious.”—Derrick Jensen, Utne Reader

Previous works from John Zerzan include Elements of Refusal, Future Primitive, Against Civilization, Running on Emptiness, and Questioning Technology. He has also contributed to Apocalypse Culture, Telos, and Fifth Estate. An Oregonian with degrees from Stanford University and San Francisco State University, he is an editor of Green Anarchy magazine.

Over 100 years ago the infamous Haymarket affair in Chicago pierced the world with news of what would now be characterized as “terrorist violence.” In the Haymarket incident, a bomb killed police gathered to club and maul labor protesters. And although the police could not find the man who threw the bomb, labor and anarchist leaders were found guilty in a notoriously ugly trial, and several were actually hanged.

Frank Harris’ novel comes from the point-of-view of the uncaught bomb-thrower, a German immigrant in love with the extreme political tactics of the notorious anarchist Louis Lingg.

The Feral House edition of The Bomb contains an afterword by anarchist thinker John Zerzan, and an anti-anarchist introduction by novelist John Dos Passos.

“This book is, in truth, a masterpiece; so intense is the impression that one almost asks, ‘Is this a novel or confession? Did not Frank Harris perhaps throw the bomb?’ At least he has thrown one now… the best novel I have ever read.”
— Aleister Crowley, occultist

John Zerzan, anarcho-primitivist philosopher, ideological friend to Ted Kaczynski, and mentor to the anti-Globalist anarchists who set the world aflame in Seattle and Europe, is back with Running on Emptiness: The Pathology of Civilization.

Author of Elements of Refusal, Questioning Technology, Future Primitive and Other Essays, Why Hope? and the editor of Against Civilization: Readings and Reflections, Zerzan’s anti-technology writings are widely considered the most radical tonic to the crisis of our time.

 

“John Zerzan’s importance does not only consist in his brilliant intelligence, his absolute clearness of analysis and his unequalled dialectical synthesis that clarifies even the most complicated questions, but also in the humanity that fills his thoughts of resistance. Future Primitive Revisited is one more precious gift for us all.”
—Enrico Manicardi,
Author of Liberi dalla Civiltá (Free from Civilization)

 

As our society is stricken with repeated technological disasters, and the apocalyptic problems that go with them, the “neo-primitivist” essays of John Zerzan seem more relevant than ever.

 

“Future Primitive,” the core innovative essay of Future Primitive Revisited, has been out of print for years. This new edition is updated with never-before-printed essays that speak to a youthful political movement and influential writers such as Derrick Jensen and Paul Theroux.

 

“Of course we should go primitive. This doesn’t mean abandoning material needs, tools, or skills, but ending our obsession with such concerns. Declaring for community, our true origin: personal autonomy, trust, mutual support in pursuit of all the joys and troubles of life. Society was a trap—massive, demanding, impersonal and debilitating from day one. So hurry back to the community, friends, and welcome all the consequences of such an orientation. The reasons for fear and despair will only multiply if we remain in this brutal and dangerous state of civilization.”—Blok 45 publishing, Belgrade

 

 

The lofty view of man’s progress called ‘history’ deserves a new perspective-that of the common person, not liberated but burdened by modernity.

The American anarchist, primitivist philosopher, and author John Zerzan critiques agriculture-based civilization as inherently oppressive and advocates drawing upon the life of hunter-gatherers as an inspiration for what free society should look like. Subjects of his criticism include domestication, language, symbolic thought, and the concept of time.

This book includes sixteen essays ranging from the beginning of civilization to today’s general crisis. Zerzan provides a critical perspective about civilization.

• Zerzan’s previous books, Against Civilization, Running on Emptiness, Twilight of the Machines, and Why Hope? explore the complex duality role of man in and against nature.

John Zerzan is an American anarchist and primitivist philosopher and author. Zerzan is the editor Black and Green Review,(http://www.blackandgreenreview.org/)  a bi-annual compendium of anarcho-primitivist thought. He is also the host of Anarchy Radio in Eugene on the University of Oregon‘s radio station KWVA. He has also served as a contributing editor at Anarchy Magazine and has been published in magazines such as AdBusters. He does extensive speaking tours around the world.

With mass poisonings, global warming and other tidings of contemporary civilization threatening the planet, shouldn’t we begin to reconsider our unthinking attachment to it?

Feral House’s new expanded edition of Against Civilization adds 18 new essays and feral illustrations by R.L. Tubbesing to the contemporary classic that provides 67 thought-provoking looks into the dehumanizing core of modern civilization, and the ideas that have given rise to the anarcho-primitivist movement. The editor of this compelling anthology is John Zerzan, author of Running on Emptiness (Feral House) and Future Primitive.

“I celebrate John Zerzan’s anthology harboring the best of civilized people’s critiques of civilization. Herein the reader will discover the questions that need to be asked and the insights that beg to be nurtured if humankind and the natural world as we know it are to thrive into the future. This book is that important.”
— Chellis Glendinning, author of My Name is Chellis and I’m in Recovery from Western Civilization

“It is its collective refusal to say ‘Here is civilization: just accept it’ that makes this volume so important. Read it and you will never think of civilization in the same way again. Or put any more faith than a grain of mustard seed in its unimpeded future.”
— Kirkpatrick Sale, author of Rebels Against the Future

“This is an extraordinary collection by the most important anarchist thinker of our time, a potent introduction to, as Zerzan so accurately puts it, the pathology of civilization. For decades now Zerzan has been articulating a practical and theoretical critique of civilization, and this book—though an edited anthology of his own and other people’s essays—brings it all together in a compelling, undeniable way. I love all of Zerzan’s books, but I think I love this one the best.”
— Derrick Jensen, author of A Language Older Than Words

“Is it only terrorists we’re worried about? We are witnessing the collision of civilization and the earth.”
— Al Gore