Foreword

I am honoured to be asked to write a Foreword to this work of genius. If not fully appreciated now, it will, nevertheless, live as one of the outstanding records of what libertarian thought has achieved in our time, just as the work of Rowlandson, Gilray, Low and other greats show us the best that satire achieved in their times. It is not only a work of genius, but of great originality, using outrageous knockabout comedy to convey serious ideas, and tragic commentary on important dilemmas of the human situation. Just as the surrealist movement, by unusual means, achieved some success in attacking authoritarian evils, so this strangely effective technique of using utter farce to get below intellectual defences is successful in getting us to face challenges that no mere political pamphleteering could so. Are we serious about anarchism? If so we must consider the split within ourselves between the Wildcat and the intellectual Free Range Egghead.

Evil, in its most atrocious forms as depicted here, is presented not as deeply sinful, but as clownish, grotesque, abominable, bizarre, absurd and pathetic — and we long to take a swipe at it with the Wildcat. But in the midst of our laughter and indignation, we come up against the painful truth that the political “left” is as ridiculous as the “right”. And we anarchists, with our eyes open, mustaccept the uncomfortable fact that we too can be ridiculous in the passionate pursuit of our ideals, but our pride lies in that we can accept the absurdity of much that we do and say, provided that we have the courage to cling to human values, and preserve a sense of humour.

Tony Gibson