species being and other stories

by frére dupont

In this small and rich text, one of the authors of Nihilist Communism introduces an anti-political perspective in the form of letters, essays, and dialogs.

Genres: Theory, Anarchism

paperback

First published January 1, 2007

Reviews

[clinamen · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of short pieces by one half of the Monsieur Dupont group is a opaque, playful, and cerebral read that requires patience, careful attention, and rewards the reader based on how much they put into it. Expanding on themes from Nihilist Communism, two of the central ideas explored herein are the irreducible, constant nature of revolt against dominant social relations and how organizations, by virtue of their form, might turn the forces which recuperate and co-opt the revolutionary drive into instruments for furthering the development of communism. The author tackles these subjects in a largely non-polemical style, eschewing a conventional didactic structure for an interlacing of forms incorporating imaginary dialogues, one-sided correspondences, pseudo-parables, historical anthropologies, brief vignettes from daily life, and loose essays. This book really breaks out many of the widespread, reductive notions about organization that predominate anarchist communities and presents an entirely new perspective that is unlike anything I've ever read before. The style gets dense at times, but always remains adventurous and evocative, and it is the kind of writing that screams for multiple readings. I found that while the first few sections were certainly thought-provoking, it wasn't until the Dialogues section and after that I truly began to be blown away by what I was reading, and from there until the end I could not put it down. The conclusion in particular left me a bit breathless. Not for everyone, certainly, but for readers looking for a thoughtful analysis of organization, revolt, and other issues which are central to anarchism but usually only receive cursory examination, species being will occupy a privileged place on your bookshelf.

[Sceox · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some of the best of contemporary radical theory.

[Severin M · Rating 4 out of 5]

If Nihilist Communism was too pessimistic, this is its antidote. Ironically Sartrian, this text ultimately grabs onto his notions and rebrands them in order to salvage any viable notions of progressive political action. The question is if the result is simply a corrective installation of quasi-pessimistic poetry or something whose framework can be salvaged from itself (and the hands it has desperately grasped it from). What one gets from this which one could not get from Critique of Dialectical Reason is yet to be seen. Even then, what one gets out of CoDR that is of any worth on its own is a difficult enough inquiry in itself!

In any case, we are still here and we are delighted to have spent time with this text.

[Stephanie McGarrah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a frustrating read for me. I don't love it, but I don't hate it. There's some choice quotes about the Left that post-leftists will appreciate, ("Only when the left is in disarray, turning on itself in a fury of self-hatred do ideas of revolutionary value break out, only when the left despairs of itself is there room for a vaguely human becoming") but besides those moments I mostly just felt like the words were going over my head. In the end, I just didn't like the style, but there's enough here to recommend to leftists just dipping into the post-left.

[Marty · Rating 3 out of 5]

thought provoking continuation themes from Nihilist Communism though defintely more hopeful in tone.