Years before he was famous as the co-author of the Illuminatus! trilogy, Robert Anton Wilson was writing astute essays about the evils of authoritarianism, prejudice, puritanism, and exploitation. The essays and interviews in this book span 45 years, from 1960 to 2005, responding to events from the Bay of Pigs invasion to the War on Terror. Along the way, they will introduce you, or re-introduce you, to the thinkers who influenced Wilson the most-Spooner, Tucker, Proudhon, Warren, Reich, Fuller, Korzybski, and others.
Calling for liberty, tolerance, and compassion, Wilson was loyal to neither the political left nor the political right - he preferred to call his ideas "non-Euclidean." These writings deviate from traditional Euclidean models of the political spectrum where the ideological landscape is easily mappable. Here, politics are as complex, multidimensional, and unconventional as the human mind.
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"Say what you like about the principles of anarchism, Robert Anton Wilson said it earlier, better, and funnier."
- Ken MacLeod, author of The Star Fraction and Beyond The Hallowed Sky
"An encyclopedic scholar of human folly, or maybe simply the folly of being human."
- Andrei Codrescu, author of The Disappearance of the Outside: a Manifesto For Escape
"Wilson understood that true freedom requires breaking everyone's chains, not building higher walls around private compounds."
- Mark Frauenfelder, co-founder of Boing Boing
"The imagination, wit, and humanity evident in these essays animated Robert Anton Wilson's politics and writing."
- Revd Jonathan Harris, High Priest of Church of Burn
"A unique combination of compassion and erudition that will light up your neural pathways like Times Square on New Year's Eve."
- Lewis Shiner, author of Glimpses
"A volume of priceless wisdom from a multi-dimensional intellect."
- Victor Koman, author of The Jehovah Contract and Kings of the High Frontier
