CATALOG
(Books written or translated by Ken Knabb)
Public
Secrets: Collected Skirmishes of Ken Knabb
Bureau of Public Secrets, 1997 [Distributed by PM Press]
ISBN 978-0-93968-203-4
408 pages. $15.00
Ken Knabb is best known for his meticulous translations of numerous works by
Guy Debord and the Situationist International. Public Secrets is a
comprehensive collection of his own writings over a period of three decades.
The first half of the book consists of two
major new texts. “The Joy of Revolution” is a series of observations on the
problems and possibilities of a situationist revolution. Beginning with a brief
overview of the failures of Bolshevism and the inadequacies of reformism, it
examines the pros and cons of a wide range of radical tactics, then concludes
with some provocative speculations on what a liberated society might be like.
“Confessions of a Mild-Mannered Enemy of the State” is largely concerned with
Knabb’s situationist activities, but it also includes reminiscences of the
sixties counterculture and accounts of his Zen practice and other later
ventures.
The second half of the book presents a variety
of pamphlets, posters, comics, and articles on Wilhelm Reich, Kenneth Rexroth,
Gary Snyder, radical Buddhists, Japanese anarchists, Chinese dissidents, the
1970 Polish revolt, the 1979 Iranian uprising, and the 1991 Gulf war.
The aim throughout is to bring the real choices
into the open and to incite people to make their own radical experiments.
Table of Contents and online texts
Situationist
International Anthology
Revised and Expanded Edition
Edited and translated by Ken Knabb
PM Press, 2024
ISBN: 979-8-887440-57-6
ISBN (ebook): 979-8-887440-66-8
544 pages. $29.95
In 1957 a few European avant-garde groups came together to form the
Situationist International. Picking up where the dadaists and surrealists
had left off, the situationists challenged people’s passive conditioning
with carefully calculated scandals and the subversive tactic of
détournement. Seeking a more extreme social revolution than was dreamed
of by most leftists, they developed an incisive critique of the global
spectacle-commodity system and of its “Communist” pseudo-opposition, and
their new methods of agitation helped trigger the May 1968 revolt in France.
Since then (although the SI itself was dissolved in 1972) situationist
theories and tactics have continued to inspire radical currents all over the
world.
The Situationist International Anthology
is the most comprehensive and accurately translated collection of
situationist writings in English. It presents a rich variety of articles,
leaflets, graffiti, and internal documents, ranging from the situationists’
early experiments in “psychogeography” to their lucid analyses of the Watts
riot, the Vietnam War, the Prague Spring, the Chinese “Cultural Revolution,”
and other crises and upheavals of the sixties.
For this new edition all the translations have
been fine-tuned and the bibliography has been updated to include comments on
dozens of newer books by and about the situationists.
Table of Contents and online texts
Guy Debord:
The Society of the Spectacle
Translated and annotated by Ken Knabb
PM Press, 2024
ISBN: 979-8-88744-056-9
ISBN (ebook): 979-8-88744-065-1
160 pages. $19.95
The Society of the Spectacle, originally published in Paris in 1967,
has been translated into more than twenty other languages and is arguably the
most important radical book of the twentieth century. This is the first edition
in any language to include extensive annotations, clarifying the historical
allusions and revealing the sources of Debord’s “détournements.”
Contrary to popular misconceptions, Debord’s book
is neither an ivory tower “philosophical” discourse nor a mere expression of
“protest.” It is a carefully considered effort to clarify the most fundamental
tendencies and contradictions of the society in which we find ourselves — in
order to facilitate its overthrow. This makes the book more of a challenge, but
it is also why it remains so pertinent more than half a century after its
original publication, while countless other social theories and intellectual
fads have come and gone.
It has, in fact, become more pertinent than ever,
because the spectacle has become more all-pervading than ever — to the point
that it is almost universally taken for granted. Most people today have scarcely
any awareness of pre-spectacle history, let alone of anti-spectacle
possibilities. As Debord noted in his follow-up work, Comments on the
Society of the Spectacle
(1988), “spectacular domination has succeeded in raising an entire generation
molded to its laws.”
Table of Contents and online text
Guy Debord:
Complete Cinematic Works
Translated and edited by Ken Knabb
AK Press, 2003
ISBN 978-1-90259-383-8
268 pages, 62 illustrations. $19.00
Guy Debord, founder of the Situationist International and fomenter of the May
1968 revolt in France, was also the creator of six tantalizingly inaccessible
films. Following the still-unsolved assassination of the films’ producer in
1984, all of them were withdrawn from circulation for nearly twenty years. This
new translation of Debord’s filmscripts (which Knabb was asked to make by
Debord's widow) was prepared to accompany the long-awaited rerelease of these
astonishing works.
Technically and aesthetically, Debord's films are
among the most brilliantly innovative works in the history of the cinema. But
they are not so much "works of art" as carefully calculated subversive
provocations. One of the films is an adaptation of Debord’s own book, The
Society of the Spectacle. Others evoke his adventures in the bohemian
underworld of 1950s Paris, which he contrasts with the increasingly ignorant,
ugly, and alienated world that has since been produced by modern capitalism. In
each case Debord simultaneously attacks the film medium itself, challenging
spectators to create their own adventures instead of passively consuming the
pseudo-adventures that are presented to them.
Note: This book is temporarily out of print. It will be republished by PM Press in Spring 2026. Meanwhile, used copies can be found here.
Table of Contents, online excerpts, and general information about Debord’s films
Ngo Van:
In the Crossfire: Adventures of a Vietnamese Revolutionary
Edited by Ken Knabb and Hélène Fleury
Translated by Hélène Fleury, Hilary Horrocks, Ken Knabb, and Naomi Sager
AK Press, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-84935-013-6
ISBN (ebook): 978-1-84935-049-5
296 pages, 70 illustrations. $19.95
Although the Vietnam War is still well known, few people are aware of
the decades of struggles against the French colonial regime that
preceded it, many of which had no connection with the Stalinists (Ho Chi
Minh’s Communist Party). The Stalinists were ultimately victorious, but
only after they systematically destroyed all the other oppositional
currents. This book is the story of these other movements and revolts,
caught in the crossfire between the French and the Stalinists, told by
one of the few survivors.
Ngo Van’s In the Crossfire is one of those rare
books like Voline’s The Unknown Revolution or Orwell’s Homage
to Catalonia that almost single-handedly unveil moments of hidden
history — sublime moments when people break through the bounds of the
“possible” and strive to create a life worthy of their deepest dreams
and aspirations.
Table of Contents and online text