Contents
Out of all the books and texts we read, this one was the least surprising for me. Probably because it is so straight forward. (Later note: I really like the fact that felt remorse or regret for writing this book and has been trying to stop it’s production) Powell writes his book in a style of recipes, hence why it’s called a cookbook. At the beginning of the book he defines Anarchism, which is “a wide-scale mass uprising by the people, similar to that of civil disobedience through violence.” Anarchists believe that power is always the problem and are the “guardians of liberty”. Powell continues to reiterate that “Anarchism is about resisting forces of oppression”. He ends his introduction with a warning that the contents of his book are extremely dangerous and readers should proceed with caution.
The main contents of the book contain instructions for the production of explosives, booby traps, improvised weapons, telecommunication devices, tear gas, and drugs.
Context
In 1969, Powell quit his job and began to write The Anarchist Cookbook, his simple motivation of writing it was purely just to express his anger. He was actively pursued by the US military to serve and possibly die in the Vietnam war. In 1971 he finally published the book. He wanted the book to show to the public that the Vietnam war had undermined human values and individualism.
40 years later, Powell regrets writing the cookbook, he realises that the anger that motivated him to write the cookbook blinded him to “the illogical notion that violence can be used to prevent violence.” He publishes the cookbook with his comments, and for the last 40 years he had become a teacher and taught in communities in Asia and Africa, often not as developed. He believes that there should be a connection between a teacher and their student, that teacher’s have a responsibility to understand and sympatise for a child’s emotional and mental state. Powell understands that his book has been an “inspiration” for children and young teenagers to commit crimes, he believes it’s due to isolation and they had found comfort in his book.
“I do not know the influence the book may have had on the thinking of the perpetrators if these attacks, but I cannot imagine that it was positive. The continued publication of the Cookbook serves no purpose other than a commercial one for the publisher. It should quickly and quietly go out of print.” – William Powell
The Anarchist cookbook did not belong to Powell, it belonged to it’s publisher. 🙁