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{{infoboxinfobox1
|title=Against All Authority: Anarchism and the Literary Imagination
|author=Jeff Shantz
|borrow=Maybe
|isbn=9781845402372
|paperback=1845402375
|hardback=
|audiobook=
|ebook=
|pages=148
|publisher=Imprint Academic
|date=March 2011
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845402375</amazonuk>
|amazonus=<amazonus>1845402375</amazonus>
|website=
|video=
|summary=Not for a general readership, but with a possible audience outside the strictest academia, ''Against All Authority'' is indeed as its author wished, a valuable opening in the exploration of the intersection between anarchist ideology and literary production. There are some noticeable biases but the passion makes it more interesting to read than the usual scholarly analyses.
|cover=1845402375
|aznuk=1845402375
|aznus=1845402375
}}
From Chesterton and Joseph Conrad to Joyce and Eugene O'Neil, Wole Soyinka to LeGuin, punk zines to Chomsky, Shantz offers students and scholars of literature a valuable and relatively unusual perspective (it's surprising how popular Marxist lit-crit is by comparison).
''Against All Authority'' is a scholarly text, possibly a PhD dissertation adapted for a book publication, and has to be approached as such. Although I am a keen reader and have some interest in literary criticism, I don't have enough knowledge of this field (or anarchist thought for that matter) to venture a comparative judgement and I will thus .
I was actually surprised in how readable, interesting and relevant I found some of the analyses in ''Against All Authority''.
The same was true for the chapter on drama and to lesser extent the whole of ''Against All Authority''. I am sure Shantz has a reason to refer to Goldman so much, but to my lay eye (doubly lay - firstly, because I am not a literary theorist, and secondly, because I am not deeply immersed in anarchist thought) this reliance on an author that belongs neither to the canonical sources of the anarchist thinking nor to the up-to-date cutting edge badly affects the argument by making it somewhat outdated and yet not timeless.
From my entirely non-specialist position ''Against All Authority'' was an illuminating read and to a significant extent fulfilled its initial promise, striking the right balance between the number of themes it covers and the depth of analysis.
I found the language and style surprisingly accessible for a field known for its esoteric obscurity.
Not for a general readership, but with a possible audience outside the strictest academia, ''Against All Authority'' is indeed as its author wished, a valuable opening in the exploration of the intersection between anarchist ideology and literary production. It made me want to re-read Le Guin's ''Dispossesed'' and led me to the fascinating offerings of the [http://www.akpress.org/ AK Press].
[[:Category:Noam Chomsky|Noam Chomsky]] is the poster-child of North American anarcho-syndicalism and a required reading for anybody interested in revolutionary thought. [[:Category:John Pilger|John Pilger]] made it his life's task to offer stories of the dispossessed and forgotten crushed by the global cogs of power. [[:Category:Ursula K Le Guin|Le Guin]] is worth reading regardless of political persuasions. One author that very openly explores political options – including a lot of anarchist but not particularly feminist versions - is the Scottish speculative fiction writer [[:Category:Ken MacLeod|Ken MacLeod]] although we don't have reviews of the ''Fall Revolution'' series in which the political speculation is at its most vigorous. Speaking of Scottish sci-fi, [[:Category:Ian Iain M Banks|Iain M. Banks']] Culture presents a world with a strong anarchist streak.  {{amazontext|amazon=1845402375}}{{amazonUStext|amazon=1845402375}}
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[[Category:Popular Science]]

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