No Gods No Masters: An Anthology of Anarchism, Book Two

by Daniel Guérin (Editor)

This is the first English translation of Guerin's monumental anthology of Anarchism. It details, through a vast array of hitherto unpublished documents, writings, letters and reports, the history, organization and practice of the anarchist movement -- its theorists, advocates and activists.

Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Daniel Guérin was a French anarcho-communist author, best known for his work Anarchism: From Theory to Practice , as well as his collection No Gods No Masters: An Anthology of Anarchism in which he collected writings on the idea and movement it inspired, from the first writings of Max Stirner in the mid-19th century through the first half of the 20th century.

He is also known for his opposition to Nazism, fascism, Stalinism and colonialism, in addition to his support for the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) during the Spanish Civil War, and his revolutionary defence of free love and homosexuality.

Reviews

[Ietrio · Rating 1 out of 5]

A weird personal book. Somebody (Guerin) decided he likes anarchy so much that he needs to make a book about it. Inside there is a strange mix of biographies and excerpts of the most important books of certain authors. The text is not well referenced. And in the end you get a good inside into what Guerin feels of anarchy and almost nothing about the anarchist movement. The same way some have tried to make a coherent system of gods out of the anarchic (pun intended) set of cults and temples in ancient Rome or Greece, the same way Guerin tries to give a direction to a group of people that stood for extremely different goals and paths. And only the need for a short text makes this hagiographies look like biographies.

Guerin seems to be interesting because of a shortage of authors to cover this part of political theory. Otherwise he is unclear at places. And has the bad habit of using and abusing page notes. This way important information is delegated to the small text area. And that's not enough for him. Important references are given late in the text and only a see page XX before that.

Back in 1970 it might have been hard to gather all these books and biographies. In 2015 you are better off reading the originals and checking out the biographies that are online.

I am also in the presence of a badly executed copy (editions la decouverte) with references that go to the wrong pages.

[Rone]

Almost finished. So far so good!!