Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International

by Kevin Coogan

Francis Parker Yockey, lawyer & former war-crimes prosecutor, was one of the most enigmatic figures inside the far right in both Europe & America. His story is at the heart of the postwar Fascist International, a shadow Reich composed of conspirators, spies & occultists. This study is a treasure chamber for all interested in the ideological heirs of fascism & Nazism, of National bolshevism, Odinism, various occult sects of the extreme right & groups trying to provide a synthesis between extreme left & far-right thought--Walter Laquer (edited)
Acknowledgements
Foreword
Introduction
Jailhouse Ragnarok
Genealogy of Morals
Under Vesuvius
On the Edge
In the Imperium
Behind Enemy Lines
Kali Yuga
Shadow Reich
Die Welt-Ein Tor
World in Flames
The Cult of St. Francis
Left of the Right
Conclusion
Appendix A: Nos
Appendix B: Secret Societies & Subversive Movements
Appendix C: Roll over Bachofen
Appendix D: Left-wing Fascism: Latin Style
Appendix E: Sheik Francois-Friend to Hitler & Carlos the Jackel
Appendix F: Three Patron Saints of Red Fascism
Appendix G: The Whites & the Reds
Appendix H: Lee Harvey Oswald's Address Book
Appendix I: The Devil & Francis Parker Yockey
Index

Genres: History, Biography, Politics, Germany, Nazi Party, Nonfiction, American History

646 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 1999

About the author

American investigative journalist. He is best known for the biography Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International.

Coogan's work has appeared in The Village Voice, Mother Jones, Hit List, and The Nation. He has been interviewed a number of times on Dave Emory's For the Record radio show.

Coogan published some writings about the Larouche Movement online under the pseudonym Hylozoic Hedgehog.

Reviews

[John Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although this book is seriously flawed in some respects, such as in the author's obsessive need to tie together highly disparate, very unlikely figures into the global fascist conspiracy that he claims to have unearthed (Adam Parfrey of Feral House and Michael Moynihan of Blood Axis are said to be linchpins of this "fascist international," which should give you some idea of the ridiculousness of some of his claims), it still remains an invaluable resource due to the amount of research that went into it, as well as the breadth of topics it covers. In addition to presenting much that was previously unknown about Yockey himself, Coogan details a great deal about the various figures and groups he had been in contact with, and as a result he ends up producing what is the closest thing to a unified account of the "Far Right" in Europe and the United States that has yet been written. It also would have helped if he had been able to keep his own prejudices out of the text (at one point he casually refers to Julius Evola as having been insane, while providing no proof for this assertion, for instance). Those who find these subjects interesting will discover a feast between these covers. Nevertheless, the definitive biography of Yockey, and the definitive history of the "Far Right" since 1945, remains to be written.

[Erik Graff · Rating 4 out of 5]

There was a time, back when Dad was in school, when fascism and nazism were studied in political science courses just as monarchism, republicanism, communism, socialism and anarcho-syndicalism are today. This certainly wasn't the case when I took a survey course in the subject. Fascism and National Socialism, thanks to the war Dad contributed to, were historical curiosities and any serious treatment of them as contenders for social implementation was taboo. Nowadays anyone who treats of these matters seriously automatically is consigned to the lunatic fringe.

Granted, there was a substantial difference between Italian fascism, or corporatism, and German National Socialism, but there was a family resemblance between them as well. The war and the residue of the propagandistic efforts of those allied against Germany, Italy and the other axis powers have had the effect of, on the one hand, obscuring the differences and, on the other hand, failing to acknowledge the many currents within both the Italian and the German (and Rumanian, and Croat, and Hungarian etc.) rightwing movements. For instance, not all of them were nationalistic. Fascism had its internationalist currents as well. Nor were all of them racist. And, yes, some of the national socialists actually favored the working classes. Although the social experiments of Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy ended with the two dictators' deaths, the ideologies they have come to be all-too-simplistically identified with have lived on, albeit often under different names and often in quite different forms.

Francis Parker Yockey, a fellow native of Chicago's Rogers Park neighborhood, was one homegrown rightist who, while identified more or less with the pre-war rightist experiments aforementioned, continued on, following his own way down some surprising paths. It is not always recognized sufficiently how much these movements were anti-capitalist. The Germans demonized the Jews, but much of the reason they got away with that was by playing on the popular belief that international finance capitalism was a Jewish enterprise, an international Jewish conspiracy. Yockey was definitely anti-capitalist, so much so that towards the end of his life he was actively allied with communists and socialists in what he saw as a common struggle against capitalism. How this was so, what currents of thought he represented and developed, and how these currents continue to flow, albeit subterraneanly, constitutes the intriguing substance of this very interesting and eye-opening book.

[Cwn_annwn_13 · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a huge book that chronicles a mostly unknown part of the history of white nationalism. It mainly focuses on Francis Parker Yockey but also has a lot of interesting info on Evola, Spengler, Viereck and other lesser known figures in the post ww2 fascist underground.

Yockey was an (arguably) insane genius type who led a cloak and dagger existance throughout Europe and America. This book does its best to piece his movements and activities together. Yockey was best known for his book Imperium which very few people actually read while Yockey was alive. Yockey is much like Julius Evola and Savitri Devi in that more people read their works now than when they were living. It seems to be all the rage in certain quarters to claim to be into Yockey, Evola and Devi as of late.

From what I understand a good portion of the research for Dreamer of the Day was done by a so called "right wing" type who was very much into Yockeys ideologies and turned over his info to Coogan shortly before his death. Coogan, although a leftist, is a very fair and impartial writer and did a great job with this book. This is certainly one of the best books written to date that covers any section of white nationalist history.

[Doug Brunell · Rating 5 out of 5]

As far as biographies go, this one is simply amazing. It looks as if it would be a bear to get through, but it is written in such a style that you'll breeze through it.

Who is Francis Parker Yockey? Oh, I don't wan to give too much away, but let's say he was a writer, philosopher and fascist. There is so much more to him than that, however, and all of it is fascinating.

Yockey's story isn't something that is taught in schools, but it would make for a fascinating movie. As of this time, this is the most complete book on the man, and if you have any interest whatsoever in interesting figures, this is one story you need to know.

[AC · Rating 5 out of 5]

(Sadly, Kevin Coogan has just died)

A brilliant, deeply researched study of the Postwar Fascist International, to which Yockeyism has become something of a mainstay. The key is that Yockey revived the Strasserite trend. A must read for anyone interested in this topic.

[Tommy · Rating 5 out of 5]

There's a decent historico-psychological summation of the situation leading up to Yockeys suicide here but the bulk of this is about Yockeys various liaisons and expounding on Weimar Conservative Revolutionaries, Julius Evola, Hans Blüher, George Sylvester Viereck and other such characters up to 1990s Satanism/Black Metal. He admits the more exoteric rightists from George Lincoln Rockwell to Oswald Mosley actively opposed Yockeys ideas and his biggest American promoter Willis Carto never actually "got" him. If "Yockeyism" was never a serious force (Jean-François Thiriart seems to be the only true follower he cites) why recapitulate some nefarious mythos Yockey obviously preemptively self-created? It segues into implying the circle emerging around Aleksandr Dugin in Russia in the 1990s as being some potentially dangerous threat so maybe that was the contemporary message when this was written but it's obvious Coogan doesn't want to get to far into how most of the supposed Yockey connections in Europe really tie into Operation Gladio/CIA backed networks and why they would oppose Yockey. Heavily footnoted with plenty of obscure sources. There's something here if you want to look.

[Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

mostly uses the mysterious figure of yockey(who is a real crank's crank even in this dubious company) as a throughline to connect various tendencies and figures within the far right, with a big emphasis on 'national bolshevik' or strasserist types. personally i found the earlier sections of the book about ww2 and the immediate postwar period to be the most compelling, it sort of loses the thread a little once yockey dies and we're hearing about far rightists who just probably namedropped him at some point rather than were actually interacting with him. still a good resource if you are interested in so called 'left' nazis though or nazi cranks more generally.

[Grump · Rating 2 out of 5]

Brutal. Kevin Coogan needs an editor. There were kernels of interestingness peppered through out but one has to sift through overly verbose tangential random shit. Basically, Francis Parker Yockey was some kind of semi autistic American guy who hated America and was all into a heroic ideal of a united fascist Europe founded on transcendent heroic values. What that means is muddy at best but it doesn't involve jews or capitalism. So he writes a book called Imperium (which is fucking impenetrable). Nobody really pays attention to it except for Willis Carto. This is because everybody who's a postwar fascist thinks they have the best idea for making a fascist superpower to rival America. Yockey thinks Europe should unite and ally with the USSR because they're better than the USA. Whatever. He galavants around the world and uses a bunch of aliases. The book goes into EXTREME detail about everyone he meets and gets along or argues with. So many pamphlets. So many not-so-robust organizations. In the end he dies mysteriously in prison and the book does nothing to really clear that up. But a bunch of people who weren't Francis Parker Yockey argued and wrote letters and pamphlets and nobody really felt much of an impact.

I don't know why I read this. Seemed like the dude would have an interesting story. But no. He was a mild perv who had some kind of boring ideas. The end.

[Daniel Burton-Rose · Rating 5 out of 5]

An impressive intertwining of fascist intellectual history and organization, overt and covert. At a time when "Nazi" has largely become an empty epithet ("food Nazi," "grammar Nazi"...), it's refreshing to read this catalog of unexpected ideological configurations. Coogan takes far right thinkers seriously on their own terms, without losing sight of the hideous costs of their myriad victories.

[Greg · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don’t have it in me to do a whole review but if I write nothing now, I’ll forget. Most interesting aspects:

-geopolitical argument for Germany aligning with Russia regardless of their domestic politics allowed for strange, if small, fascist support for USSR
-this book definitely makes me reconsider the ‘fascism is just liberalism in decay’ interpretation I’ve generally had. It is its own ideology that holds economic questions in secondary regard (makes it easily used as a tool by the liberal powers? If so it really does kind of make liberalism the scarier part of the political triangle)
-man, the obsession with antisemitism is just perpetually amazing. So hard to wrap my head around, to get into their heads.
-explicit anti-rationalism is fascinating, could never imagine a sort of academic track of thinking that would lead there, but it has its own crazy, if seemingly consistent, logic.
-the anti-“Stalinist” bent and there only being sympathetic words for Israel (re: fascists, so more understandable) is the only aspect that really made me feel skeptical. I think the author used to be a Larouchite?
- I read this because it was Jimmy Falun Gong’s final rec before leaving twitter. Glad I did.

[Camille · Rating 5 out of 5]

A far ranging history/biography of Francis Parker Yockey, American Fascist in and around WW2 and after, this book packs quite a punch. By examining the life and writings of Yockey and its Spenglerian roots, Coogan deftly (if quite "wordy") navigates the hidden Right, in the US after the War. The fascist international was at its peak right after the war and for some time thereafter. He examines the philosophical/historical underpinnings of National Socialism/Fascism, by touching on Carl Schmitt, and Karl Haushofer whose ideas deserve further study. He also mentions the occult aspect of Nazism/Fascism. There were many on the extreme right who believed in a Nordic/Odinistic/Pagan golden yesteryear and were mired in esoteric beliefs and rituals. This an excellent book if you are studying fascism and/or history.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

been reading in bits and pieces... published in 1999... a mysterious sinister figure but this is not a conventional biography...it is a portrait of the far right of decades...I have studied the far right for decades so I recognize the vile cast of characters...well much of it. Rachel Maddow deals with Yockey in her 2 seasons of 'Ultras'... I bought it at Left Hand Bookstore many years ago

[Ed · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun but goes on a bit too long.

[Woke · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s a page turner full of intrigue and documentation. It also reaches and speculates a lot.

[noblethumos · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Dreamer of the Day: Francis Parker Yockey and the Postwar Fascist International" by Kevin Coogan presents a meticulously researched and deeply insightful exploration into the enigmatic life and ideology of Francis Parker Yockey, a lesser-known yet significantly influential figure within post-World War II far-right movements. Coogan's book, first published in 1999, stands as a seminal work in the study of extremist ideologies and their transnational networks in the latter half of the twentieth century.

The author's approach to Yockey is comprehensive and balanced, delving not only into his political activities but also his philosophical underpinnings. Yockey, a fervent anti-Semite and a passionate advocate of a unified Europe against what he perceived as American and Soviet materialism, remains a paradoxical figure. Coogan's analysis of Yockey's magnum opus, "Imperium" – a book that sought to reframe Nazi ideology within a broader cultural and existentialist context – is particularly enlightening. The author adeptly situates "Imperium" within the broader spectrum of fascist literature, highlighting its unique contributions and its ideological inconsistencies.

A standout aspect of Coogan's work is his detailed chronicling of Yockey's extensive international connections, ranging from traditional far-right groups in Europe to more obscure entities in the Middle East and elsewhere. This global perspective is crucial in understanding the transnational nature of fascist ideologies in the postwar era and the extent to which Yockey, though a marginal figure in mainstream history, influenced these networks.

The book's academic rigor is evident in its extensive sourcing and the author's meticulous attention to detail. Coogan does not shy away from the more esoteric aspects of Yockey's thought, including his embrace of Spenglerian philosophy and his complex views on culture and race, which defy simple categorization. This depth of analysis is invaluable for scholars seeking to understand the intellectual underpinnings of postwar fascism.

However, one potential critique of "Dreamer of the Day" is its dense and occasionally labyrinthine prose, which, while reflective of its academic nature, may be daunting for casual readers. Additionally, while Coogan's work is thorough in examining Yockey's ideological legacy, there is less focus on the broader socio-political context that allowed figures like Yockey to emerge and find an audience.

Kevin Coogan's "Dreamer of the Day" is a critical and enlightening study, offering a deep dive into the complex world of post-WWII fascist ideology and its proponents. It is an essential read for historians, political scientists, and anyone interested in understanding the roots and ramifications of extremist thought in the contemporary era.

GPT

[Kersplebedeb · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely not a normal book, more like a mosaic, small chapters dealing with the one hundred and one obscure dead ends of side alleys of the far right, more an intellectual/social history than your regular anti-fascist book. i could not put it down.

This book is available from the Kersplebedeb Literature Rack. You can