Leaving the 20th Century: Situationist Revolutions

The acclaimed history of the groundbreaking Situationist movement

The Situationist International, which leaped to the fore during the Paris tumult of 1968, has extended its revolutionary influence right up to the present day. In Leaving the Twentieth Century, the movement is captured for the first time in its full range and diversity.

McKenzie Wark traces the group’s development from the bohemian Paris of the ’50s to the explosive days of May ’68. She introduces the group as an ensemble, revealing the work and activities of thinkers previously obscured by the reputation of founding member Guy Debord. Roaming through Europe and exploring the vital lives its members--including Constant, Asger Jorn, Michèle Bernstein, Alexander Trocchi, and Jacqueline de Jong--Wark uncovers a group riven with conflicting passions. She follows the narrative beyond 1968, to the Situationists International’s disintegration and beyond: the ideas of T. J. Clark, the Fourierist utopia of Raoul Vaneigem, René Vienet’s earthy situationist cinema, Gianfranco Sanguinetti’s pranking of the Italian ruling class, Alice Becker-Ho’s account of the anonymous language of the Romany, and Debord’s late films and his surprising work as a game designer.

McKenzie Wark is the author of A Hacker Manifesto, The Beach beneath the Street, The Spectacle of Disintegration, Molecular Red, Capital Is Dead, as well as the popular introductions to contemporary thought General Intellects and Sensoria. In 2017, she came out as transgender. Since, she has published her trans autofiction books, Reverse Cowgirl and Raving, and a work that combines memoir and literary criticism about Kathy Acker, Philosophy for Spiders. She teaches at Eugene Lang College, the New School.