Rating: 
Summary: Esential Reading For Anyone Who Thinks So
Review: And I think so. But most people aren't spending their days searching for the answers that are found in this book. Most would either be bored or afraid of something as profound and relevant to everyday life as TAZ. TAZ stands for Temporary Autonomous Zone: that place where we are free from influence of ALL outside forces, left with only our selves unobstructed. Scary, huh? Obviously, this is a niche book. Good for awakening the minds of those who are already partly awake. But not much else.
Rating:
Summary: the most liberating read i've had in years
Review: Bey's "Temporary Autonomous Zone" is a personal favorite of mine, and although many despise it and mistakenly write it off as mystification or the work of a phony posing as an avant garde philosopher, I am convinced it is an underground classic. This will shake your banal perceptions and your begrudging acceptance of the monotony of everyday life by advocating a form of rebelliousness and hatred for the ordinary the like or equal of which I've never seen in any other medium. Although I am in definite disagreement with his misguided denunciation of surrealism, without which he never could have written this book, Bey has created one of the most unique and fascinating revolutionary manifestoes written for decades. "Poetic Terrorism" is the most exciting idea I've encountered in a long while, and after your first read you'll be eager to start 'terrorizing' the norm yourself, even if you're the most self controlled and mild mannered person imaginable. The beauty of this tiny molotov cocktail is it's insistence that personal rebellion, rather than superficial political activism, is the real way to freedom, a conviction I've held firmly for a good deal of my life. Only through a reordering and a total recreation of the individual's perceptions can he or she be truly free, and even then the mental discipline necessary for true liberation must be maintained with the greatest vehemence. Talk about real postmodernism! This is rebellion itself. A must for anyone who distinguishes themselves from the conforming masses.
Rating:
Summary: For those who didn't know,
Review: Hakim Bey borrows from Situationism, dada, the occult, and a few other sources to create Ontological Anarchism. The result is a very strange and very wonderful pattern for a revolution that starts now. Bey is not interested in whether the dialectic has reached its head. This is a personal revolt, an insurrection in everday life.
The first section deals with Poetic Terrorism, an extension of Situationist praxis beyond street theatre. Basically, any action taken against the spectacle fits into this, but especially those aimed at institutions of misinformation. The second part is comosed of broadsheets detailing everything from surrealism to black magick. The third is TAZ proper, or improper as the case may be. Bey includes some fascinating information on pirate utopias and the lost Roanoke colonies that were almost certainly left out of your high school history book. The book does not so much suggest techniques as it does evoke a spirit of revolt. This is anarchy for those who like their insurrections occult and their politics way outside the mainstream.
Rating:
Summary: Reality Shakeup
Review: Hakim Bey is one of the most relevant writers of our times. Calling himself an anarchist he declares war on not just the government and religious institutions but on the consensus reality that it is foisted upon us by television and the mass media. Like Henry Miller before him accurately diagnosis's and offers a compelling alternative to the most pervasive spiritual crises in our society. Each page throbs with life and magnificent defiance. The writing is esoteric and eclectic there is no doubt, merely following up on the literary and philosophical references employed in T.A.Z. would provide the reader with a decent education in revolutionary and mystical thought (to Bey they are the same).
What Bey proposes is an alternative to the apoplexy of the modern Left. Acknowledging that the establishment has crushed efforts at mass resistance to it's agenda Bey encourages a kind of separatism and as an alternative to revolution, which often results in the establishment of a new dictatorship, he offers the idea of insurrection, a temporary uprising that has the attempt of keeping the powers that be in a permanent state of disarray and confusion. Essentially this means that we mimic the tactics of those who would destroy us, concentrating on damaging the Psychology behind oppression and opening up windows of opportunity where meaningful freedom can actually be practiced rather then put off to some indefinite future date. He documents the way that occult and mystical doctrines can be used as systems of liberation. Ideally this book should be read in conjunction with Michael Hoffman's Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare, which makes clear how such systems have historically been used to manipulate and enslave.
I don't agree with everything Bey writes. Some of his ideas strike me a utopian, but there his book is a powerful tonic to the slow erosion of our liberties by the tyrants and controllers of our imaginations.
Rating:
Summary: Inspiring
Review: Have a couple of dictionaries standing by, or be sure to have a few dozen bookmarked online while reading this, for if you're to appreciate Bey's prose, you're likely to need 'em. He writes in a strange way, obviously highly intelligent, but rambling, and if you're not quite sure what he's on about, it's just going to seem worse. There are a lot of ideas in here, based on things I'm not very familiar with, such as Sufism and dadism - some of which are at least partially explained, but this is one of those books you need to read, and then come back to later and see how it compares. Certainly on the first go struggling somewhat to get a feel for how his mind works on paper. It's a very inspiring work, which he may loathe to hear, but I intend to do something about it. I recommend reading it to anyone interested in expanding their interests and testing the limits of one's mind. Agreeing with everything he presents isn't necessary, but thinking about it is - doing even better. Highly recommended reading.
Rating: 
Summary: Delicious
Review: I am surprised that the sort of people attracted to such a work--to guess from previous reviews--are still apparently apt to want to swallow the thing wholly, assertions that "they lied to you, sold you ideas" and all. Personally i reckon that we are in the midst of a conspiracy, yes...but most likely an unconscious one--the aggregate of fear & complacency & ignorance & such things, that is, resulting insidiously in the effects of a sort of conspiracy. What sort of result, for example, would one really expect from blowing up a transmission tower? A sudden enlightenment of the populace? No: most people would likely become even more reactionary when faced with causes for alarm. Essentially this book, in spite of its claims to the contrary, seems to me a variety of art movement and not the "ultimate" anything, but as with anything so incendiary and beautiful its value can still hardly be overestimated. Who can resist Poetic Terrorism or Bey's felicity with language (eg. Chaote art)? The language and imagery are colourful and bursting full. Imagine a feast laid out on a table with barely enough room for the feasters' plates--and certainly not enough for their elbows--and everyone seated around it wearing purple plumage or velvet saris or nothing at all & laughing with food in their mouths. I'll take what i need and leave the rest, as it goes. Implicit in most of the writing is criticism of those who would reject any part of the "freedom" described, but who's afraid of Hakim Bey? I'm glad he wrote even if i won't be taking all of what he wrote to heart.
Rating:
Summary: Simply Amazing
Review: TAZ is an amazing book. I personally see it as a philosophy and a self-improvement book. Hakim Bey presents his ideas about how the universe should be, chaotic. If you are into chaos magic or discordianism you will find this book very appealing and its a book that must be in your collection. TAZ is a virus, it spreads through all the self-created walls that hold you down with the promise of true freedom. Suddenly you will become chaos. Assume nothing.
Rating:
Summary: Free the Mind
Review: The idea of a "beautiful" and "poetic" treatise on anarchism may seem unbelievable, but then so is Hakim Bey's "TAZ." Bey proposes an anarchism of the mind, a realm as byzantine and fantastic as an opium fever-dream and every bit as "real" as any humdrum consensus reality we have ever been expected to deal with. An all-around wonder, "Temporary Automonous Zone" even includes recipies, helpful hints on parade themes and firework displays-- fun for kids and adults alike-- plus handy tips on how to build your own arabesque reality. If you read only one book on anarchism this year, "TAZ" is the one to buy.
Rating:
Summary: Truly a Dangerous Book
Review: The work of Hakim Bey is well-known in that other american world, the "underground" society, the one of subculture, silent resistance and anarchy. But slowly it has been bubbling to the surface, often in unexpected places. The novel and film Fight Club, surely shows an affection for poetic terrorism, an idea rooted in Bey's ontological anarchism and closely related to the situationist tactic of detornement. T.A.Z. is not the property of any philosophy but chaos and elegant disorder. Sure, there are aspects of anarchism, chaos thinking, situationist leanings, but that is just a symptom of the spectacle and is such precisely because of it. These essays all point to a way out of this spectacular society, but the first step comes with the mere recognition of it. This is harder than it sounds, or perhaps easier. TV and the media are always easy components to recognize, the real challenge is to recognize how the spectacle, i.e., the prefabricated, artificial, consumerist milieu penetrates, influences and shapes even our most intimate thoughts--which we often mistake for our own desires, wants and needs. In T.A.Z. Bey offers suggestions on how we can extricate ourselves from this structure and start creating our own temporary autonomous zones, within this system of economic, social and cultural oppression. Immediatism, Poetic Terrorism, and the embrace of Chaos are just a few of the strategies that he advises, all of which presuppose a new dialectic with reality. This is only an outline, a mere review, I leave discerning and interpreting the details to you...Get this book today (also available in spoken word from axiom records).
Rating:
Summary: Truly a Dangerous Book
Review: The work of Hakim Bey is well-known in that other american world, the "underground" society, the one of subculture, silent resistance and anarchy. But slowly it has been bubbling to the surface, often in unexpected places. The novel and film Fight Club, surely shows an affection for poetic terrorism, an idea rooted in Bey's ontological anarchism and closely related to the situationist tactic of detornement. T.A.Z. is not the property of any philosophy but chaos and elegant disorder. Sure, there are aspects of anarchism, chaos thinking, situationist leanings, but that is just a symptom of the spectacle and is such precisely because of it. These essays all point to a way out of this spectacular society, but the first step comes with the mere recognition of it. This is harder than it sounds, or perhaps easier. TV and the media are always easy components to recognize, the real challenge is to recognize how the spectacle, i.e., the prefabricated, artificial, consumerist milieu penetrates, influences and shapes even our most intimate thoughts--which we often mistake for our own desires, wants and needs. In T.A.Z. Bey offers suggestions on how we can extricate ourselves from this structure and start creating our own temporary autonomous zones, within this system of economic, social and cultural oppression. Immediatism, Poetic Terrorism, and the embrace of Chaos are just a few of the strategies that he advises, all of which presuppose a new dialectic with reality. This is only an outline, a mere review, I leave discerning and interpreting the details to you...Get this book today (also available in spoken word from axiom records).
|
