38-pp. volume from a little-known British underground anarchist group, containing comics, photomontage and collage, and opinion pieces on the political climate of the time. Octavo (10 1/4 x 7 3/8 inches). Original black and white printed and side-stapled wrappers; small stain to front cover, overall excellent condition. London (Spontaneous Combustion) 1974. (Simon Ford, The Realization and Suppression of the Situationist International: An Annotated Bibliography, 1972-1992, 234). This single stand-alone volume was composed and compiled by several British nihilist and anarchist writers, including Paul Sieveking, Chris Whitbread, Nick Brandt, and Sam Fanto. The titles of the essays include "The Work of Negation [& the Negation of Work]", "Irish Bone Stew", "Today's Punch & Judy Show", and "Theses on Feminism".
The Spontaneous Combustion group introduces themselves at the end of the volume: "And who are we? A group of friends - hardly an organization. There hasn't been an equal participation in the coherence of the critique to call ourselves that (for instance, most of this journal was put together and written by just one of us)...We came together initially to produce a poster attacking the 'choice' presented at the election...If we are to continue our tentative collective existence it will be essential to develop our sense of play both amongst ourselves and through our direct intervention in the banal situations of 'life' in capitalist society...Most importantly, if our theory is to have any practical force, which it must do, if it's not to stagnate into ideology, we must develop ways of communicating it to that section of the proletariat who are initially alone capable of placing the forces of production at the service of individual needs and passions: the workers. Whilst we have appropriated the theses of the Situationist International we prefer to avoid calling ourselves situationists, a term which is increasingly becoming as vague as 'anarchists'. We have enough prisons without categories: type-casting kills."
Scarce institutionally; as of December 2023, OCLC locates only 5 holdings in North America. (Inventory #: 53114)
The Spontaneous Combustion group introduces themselves at the end of the volume: "And who are we? A group of friends - hardly an organization. There hasn't been an equal participation in the coherence of the critique to call ourselves that (for instance, most of this journal was put together and written by just one of us)...We came together initially to produce a poster attacking the 'choice' presented at the election...If we are to continue our tentative collective existence it will be essential to develop our sense of play both amongst ourselves and through our direct intervention in the banal situations of 'life' in capitalist society...Most importantly, if our theory is to have any practical force, which it must do, if it's not to stagnate into ideology, we must develop ways of communicating it to that section of the proletariat who are initially alone capable of placing the forces of production at the service of individual needs and passions: the workers. Whilst we have appropriated the theses of the Situationist International we prefer to avoid calling ourselves situationists, a term which is increasingly becoming as vague as 'anarchists'. We have enough prisons without categories: type-casting kills."
Scarce institutionally; as of December 2023, OCLC locates only 5 holdings in North America. (Inventory #: 53114)
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