Out of the Verso archive
... and back in print! From Stuart Hall to Ellen Meiksins Wood, stock up on these classic works of theory and politics.
Here we bring you some incredible writers and their definitive works that have been unavailable for some time, including the inimitable Stuart Hall on Margaret Thatcher, Ellen Meiksins Wood exploring the work of other key thinkers, and Jean-Paul Sartre's double volume reappraisal of his own philosophical and political thought. You will find books from Perry Anderson, Lynne Segal, Sheila Rowbotham, Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari, Michel Foucault, and many others below!
Please note that this is part of a wider project to bring lots of our classic works back into print (and also, in time, to fully digitize our backlist), but these are short print runs and therefore stock is limited. So if you see something you have been wanting to read then now is your time!
*Not all of these books are available in the UK, North America, and Rest of World. The book strips will indicate below whether there is stock in your region.
All these books are 40% off until June 9th at 11:59PM EST. We are still delivering books during COVID-19: see more here.
[book-strip index="1" style="buy"]
Assessing the work and background of figures such as Machiavelli, Luther, Calvin, Spinoza, the Levellers, Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau, Ellen Wood vividly explores the ideas of the canonical thinkers, not as philosophical abstractions but as passionately engaged responses to the social conflicts of their day.
[book-strip index="2" style="buy"]Patrice Lumumba, first prime minister of the Republic of Congo and a pioneer of African unity, was murdered on January 17, 1961. This book unravels the appalling mass of lies, hypocrisy and betrayals that have surrounded accounts of the assassination since it perpetration. Making use of a huge array of official sources as well as personal testimony from many of those in the Congo at the time, Ludo De Witte reveals a network of complicity ranging from the Belgian government to the CIA. Chilling official memos which detail ‘liquidation’ and ‘threats to national interests’ are analysed alongside macabre tales of the destruction of evidence, putting Patrice Lumumba’s personal strength and his dignified quest for African unity in stark contrast with one of the murkiest episodes in twentieth-century politics.
[book-strip index="3" style="buy"]In this now classic work, originally written for both newcomers to the topic and for those already familiar with the debate, Terry Eagleton unravels the many different definitions of ideology, and explores the concept's torturous history from the Enlightenment to postmodernism.
[book-strip index="4" style="buy"]Highly attuned to contemporary politics, the exchange between Nancy Fraser and Axel Honneth constitutes a rigorous dialogue on moral philosophy, social theory, and the best way to conceptualize capitalist society.
[book-strip index="5" style="buy"]First published in 1967, Guy Debord’s stinging revolutionary critique of contemporary society, The Society of the Spectacle has since acquired a cult status. Credited by many as being the inspiration for the ideas generated by the events of May 1968 in France, Debord’s pitiless attack on commodity fetishism and its incrustation in the practices of everyday life continues to burn brightly in today's age of satellite televisionand the soundbite.
[book-strip index="6" style="buy"]How and why did experience and knowledge become separated? For Walter Benjamin, the “poverty of experience” was a characteristic of modernity, originating in the catastrophe of the First World War. For Giorgio Agamben, the Italian editor of Benjamin’s complete works, the destruction of experience no longer needs catastrophes: daily life in any modern city will suffice. This is a profound meditation on language and philosophy, nature and culture, and the birth of the subject.
[book-strip index="7" style="buy"]A vibrant history in graphic art of the Industrial Workers of the World. Contributors include Carlos Cortez (former editor of the Industrial Worker), Harvey Pekar (author of American Splendor), Peter Kuper (MAD's Spy vs. Spy), Sue Coe, Seth Tobocman, Chris Cardinale, Ryan Inzana, Spain Rodriques, Trina Robbins, Sharon Rudahl, and the circle of artists for World War 3 Illustrated.
[book-strip index="8" style="buy"]A Realist Theory of Science is one of the few books that have changed our understanding of the philosophy of science. In this analysis of the natural sciences, with a particular focus on the experimental process itself, Roy Bhaskar provides a definitive critique of the traditional, positivist conception of science and stakes out an alternative, realist position.
[book-strip index="9" style="buy"]Passages from Antiquity to Feudalism is a sustained exercise in historical sociology that shows how the slave-based societies of Ancient Greece and Rome eventually became the feudal societies of the Middle Ages. In the course of this study, Anderson vindicates and refines the explanatory power of historical materialism, while casting a fascinating light on the Ancient world, the Germanic invasions, nomadic society, and the different routes taken to feudalism in Northern, Mediterranean, Eastern and Western Europe.
[book-strip index="10" style="buy"]Forty years after its original publication, Lineages of the Absolutist State remains an exemplary achievement in comparative history. Picking up from where its companion volume, Passages from Antiquity to Feudalism, left off, Lineages traces the development of Absolutist states in the early modern period from their roots in European feudalism, and assesses their various trajectories.
[book-strip index="11" style="buy"]Is heterosexual sex inherently damaging to women? This is the central question of Straight Sex, Lynne Segal’s account of twenty-five years of feminist thinking on sexuality.
[book-strip index="12" style="buy"]Groundbreaking examination of the birth, development and impact of Feminist consciousness
[book-strip index="13" style="buy"]One of the most provocative and controversial writers of his time, these essays comprise George Bataille's most incisive study of surrealism.
[book-strip index="14" style="buy"]Late Capitalism is the first major synthesis to have been produced by the contemporary revival of Marxist economics. It represents, in fact, the only systematic attempt so far ever made to combine the general theory of the “laws of motion” of the capitalist mode of production developed by Marx, with the concrete history of capitalism in the twentieth century.
[book-strip index="15" style="buy"]With the publication of Specters of Marx in 1993, Jacques Derrida redeemed a longstanding pledge to confront Marx's texts directly and in detail. Here, some major theorists discuss the renowned philosopher's most political and controversial work.
[book-strip index="16" style="buy"]Drawing on a wide range of unpublished material and observations gathered from his visit to Yugoslavia in 1999, Michael Parenti challenges mainstream media coverage of the war, uncovering hidden agendas behind the Western talk of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and democracy.
[book-strip index="17" style="buy"]Baudrillard investigates the murder of reality—“the most important event of modern history.”
[book-strip index="18" style="buy"]At the height of the Algerian war, Jean-Paul Sartre embarked on a fundamental reappraisal of his philosophical and political thought. The result was the Critique of Dialectical Reason, an intellectual masterpiece of the twentieth century, now republished with a major original introduction by Fredric Jameson. This is Volume One of this set.
[book-strip index="19" style="buy"]Volume Two of Sartre's intellectual masterpiece, introduced by Fredric Jameson.
[book-strip index="20" style="buy"]First published in 1930, Siegfried Kracauer’s work was greeted with great acclaim and soon attained the status of a classic. The object of his inquiry was the new class of salaried employees who populated the cities of Weimar Germany.
[book-strip index="21" style="buy"]In State, Power, Socialism, the leading theorist of the state and European communism advances a vigorous critique of contemporary Marxist theories of the state. Arguing against a general theory of the state, Poulantzas identifies forms of class power crucial to socialist strategy that go beyond the state apparatus.
[book-strip index="22" style="buy"]Fascinating study of the relationship between the philosopher and the psychoanalyst by major Slovenian scholar.
[book-strip index="23" style="buy"]A crown jewel of New Left historiography, this overview of U.S. Marxism was hailed on its first publication for its nuanced storytelling, balance and incredible sweep.
[book-strip index="24" style="buy"]A classic text by Rancière on the intellectual thought of French workers in the 19th century.
[book-strip index="25" style="buy"]A passionate critique of information technology and the global media.
[book-strip index="26" style="buy"]The eminent philosopher explodes the roles of pleasure and desire in contemporary politics and culture.
[book-strip index="27" style="buy"]A radical new assessment of Hegel revealing the problems and limitations of sociological method.
[book-strip index="28" style="buy"]A thrilling ride through the literature of Rimbaud in a France in the throes of revolution.
[book-strip index="29" style="buy"]Three decades after his death, Michel Foucault remains one of the towering intellectual figures of the last half-century. His works on sexuality, madness, the prison, and medicine are enduring classics. From 1971 until his death in 1984, Foucault gave public lectures at the famous Collège de France. These seminal events, attended by thousands, created the benchmarks for contemporary social enquiry.
[book-strip index="30" style="buy"]After half a century exploring dialectical thought, renowned cultural critic Fredric Jameson presents a comprehensive study of a misunderstood yet vital strain in Western philosophy.
[book-strip index="31" style="buy"]Afrocentrism, Eurocentrism, Caribbean Studies, American Studies. To the forces of cultural nationalism trapped in their respective camps, this bold book sounds a liberating call. There is, Paul Gilroy tells us, a culture that is not specifically African, American, Caribbean, or British, but all of these at once; a black Atlantic culture whose themes and techniques transcend ethnicity and nationality to produce something new and, until now, unremarked. Challenging the practices and assumptions of cultural studies, The Black Atlantic also enriches our understanding of modernism.
[book-strip index="32" style="buy"]In Uneven Development, a classic in its field, Neil Smith offers the first full theory of uneven geographical development, entwining theories of space and nature with a critique of capitalism. Featuring groundbreaking analyses of the production of nature and the politics of scale, Smith’s work anticipated many of the uneven contours that now mark neoliberal globalization. This third edition features an afterword examining the impact of Neil's argument in a contemporary context.
[book-strip index="33" style="buy"]A rich and suggestive analysis of military “ways of seeing”, revealing the convergence of perception and destruction in the parallel technologies of warfare and cinema.
[book-strip index="34" style="buy"]How have ideas about white women figured in the history of racism? Vron Ware argues that they have been central, and that feminism has, in many ways, developed as a political movement within racist societies.
[book-strip index="35" style="buy"]Key Situationist texts on the city, strikingly illustrated.
[book-strip index="36" style="buy"]Written with the energy and inventiveness that marked their earlier collaborations, What is Philosophy? is an enormous achievement. It is a vital book, not only for philosophers but for everyone concerned with the uses of human intelligence in a time when, as the authors remark, sales promotion has replaced critique.
[book-strip index="37" style="buy"]Originally published in 1988, and now back in stock, Stuart Hall's writings on the political impact of Margaret Thatcher established him as the most prescient and insightful analyst of contemporary Conservatism.
[book-strip index="38" style="buy"]Originally published in 1998, the essays collected here testify to Deleuze’s fundamental conviction that philosophy cannot be undertaken independently of science and art. As so often in his writing, the names of philosophers such as Plato, Spinoza, Kant, Nietzsche and Heidegger appear beside those of literary figures including Melville, Whitman, D.H. Lawrence, Beckett and Artaud. With this book, Deleuze’s life-long ambition to dismantle the barriers between art and its adjacent domains is brilliantly realized.
[book-strip index="39" style="buy"]The Melancholy Science is Gillian Rose’s investigation into Theodor Adorno’s work and legacy. Rose uncovers the unity discernable among the many fragments of Adorno’s oeuvre, and argues that his influence has been to turn Marxism into a search for style.
