Might Is Right: The Rebel Poetry of Covington Hall and His Satanic Lumberjacks,
Bombastic & Blasphemic Poetry from a Forgotten Labor Movement
Edited and Introduced by Kevin I. Slaughter.
Revised and Expanded Second Edition.
Available from Underworld Amusements:
https://underworldamusements.com/products/might-is-right-the-rebel-poetry-of-covington-hall
Hail to the first of rebels! To the chieftain, strong and brave,
Who sounded first the bugle-call of freedom to the slave!
Who never yet has faltered through time’s long and dreary flight—
Lucifer, the Morning Star, the splendid and the bright!
This collection of poetry is largely culled from the three labor journals that Redbeard-inspired Wobbly activist Covington Hall edited from 1913 to 1916: The Lumberjack, The Voice of the People, and Rebellion.
Hall was one of the top poets of the labor movement in the Progressive Era, and an active writer and teacher for many decades until his death in 1951. Being a member of the Industrial Workers of the World, a labor organization known for pitched street fights and “direct action,” in Hall we find the greatest advocate of the Chicago social-Darwinist Ragnar Redbeard, and his infernal book Might is Right. That inspiring book was highly critical of any paid labor, much less Union organizing for workers as a class. Like so many radicals of the day, Hall looked past the conflicting parts to focus on the core message: the only foundation for right is the ability to enforce one’s will on others.
The poems contained within this booklet are mostly from the pen of Hall, but also others that he found worthy to print in his own journals, including Dadaist anarchist sculptor Adolf Wolff, and “Satanic Socialist” Henry M. Tichenor, author of The Sorceries and Scandals of Satan. They represent that curious melding of Might and Blasphemy and Labor in often stirring but sometimes satirical ways.
Featuring an original introduction by editor-in-chief of the Union of Egoists, Kevin I. Slaughter, and a second by a contemporary of Halls, singing his praises as a poet of rebellion.
Also Available from Underworld Amusements:
YAMBO RECORDS “MIGHT IS RIGHT” | SHORT-SLEEVE T-SHIRT
Sometime in 1968, Chicago Blues legend Willie Dixon produced a spoken word album for his label Yambo Records. Willie hired Chicago’s radio legend E. Rodney Jones to deliver a powerful vocal performance and used music from a Chess Records track “This Can’t Be The End” by McKinley Mitchell. Juanita Winfield (co-producer), L. Toussaint, Lincoln T. Collins are also credited on the album.
The album was released in 1970 and featured a revolutionary poem reportedly penned by his brother Arthur while in jail. But Arthur Dixon did not originally write this poem. It was written by an Australian radical who moved to Chicago 74 years prior. His name was Arthur Desmond, better known as Ragnar Redbeard, and the book it came from was none other than the infamous “Might is Right”.
This is a “Promotional T-shirt” that never was. Created using artwork and typography from the original album, including a photo of Arthur Dixon with war club.
Introducing a special addition to the “Phantom Peregrination Souvenirs” line of t-shirts: a tribute to remarkable places and events of the past that, though real, never had the chance to boast official keepsakes. Our collection immortalizes these unsung places and objects of history, offering a tangible memento for those who appreciate the beauty of the overlooked.
ANTON THE BARBARIAN | SHORT-SLEEVET-SHIRT
1. In this arid wilderness of steel and stone I raise up my voice that you may hear. To the East and to the West I beckon. To the North and to the South I show a sign proclaiming: Death to the weakling, wealth to the strong!
2. Open your eyes that you may see, Oh men of mildewed minds, and listen to me ye bewildered millions!
3. For I stand forth to challenge the wisdom of the world; to interrogate the “laws” of man and of “God”!
4. I request reason for your golden rule and ask the why and wherefore of your ten commandments.
5. Before none of your printed idols do I bend in acquiescence, and he who saith “thou shalt” to me is my mortal foe!
6. I dip my forefinger in the watery blood of your impotent mad redeemer, and write over his thorn-torn brow: The TRUE prince of evil – the king of slaves!
7. No hoary falsehood shall be a truth to me; no stifling dogma shall encramp my pen!
8. I break away from all conventions that do not lead to my earthly success and happiness.
9. I raise up in stern invasion the standard of the strong!
10. I gaze into the glassy eye of your fearsome Jehovah, and pluck him by the beard; I uplift a broad-axe, and split open his worm-eaten skull!
11. I blast out the ghastly contents of philosophically whited sepulchers and laugh with sardonic wrath!
BLOOD AND VOLTS: EDISON, TESLA, AND THE ELECTRIC CHAIR | TH. METZGER (PRE-ORDER):
THIS IS A PRE-ORDER for the paperback edition. The books will ship close to release date of March 1st.
An ax murderer, two of the most brilliant scientific minds of the century, billions of dollars in profit, precedent-setting legal battles, secrets of life and death – all of these come together in the story of the first electric chair.
In Blood and Volts, Th. Metzger creates a unique synthesis of scholarship, storytelling, and cultural critique. Though it draws from a number of disparate fields-true crime, history of technology, conspiracy theory, criminal law-Blood and Volts presents a clear and compelling story: America struggling to define itself through scientific innovation.
At the dawn of the twentieth century, General Electric (using Edison’s direct current) and Westinghouse (employing Tesla’s groundbreaking alternating current) were locked in combat to determine which would dominate the electro-technical fate of the nation. Electricity was thought to be a highly ambiguous force: both godlike creative power and demonic destroyer of life. Metzger argues the electric chair was both harbinger and early pinnacle of modernity, the high altar of the rising cult of progress. In the popular imagination, Tesla and Edison were seen as nearly superhuman beings, and their struggle was not only for wealth and power, but to reshape the face of America.
This is a second, revised edition.
H. P. LOVECRAFT: AGAINST THE WORLD, AGAINST LIFE | MICHEL HOUELLEBECQ, STEPHEN KING (INTRO) 
Part biographical sketch, part pronouncement on existence and literature, the best-selling French novelist Michel Houellebecq’s H. P. Lovecraft: Against the World, Against Life, was published in France in 1991 and is the first non-fiction text ever published by the author.
Here, France’s most famous contemporary author praises his prewar American alter ego’s style, which couldn’t be less like his own.
With a foreword by Lovecraft admirer Stephen King, this eloquently translated edition is an insightful introduction to both Lovecraft’s dark mythology and Houellebecq’s deadpan prose.
THE LIFE AND DEATH OF YUKIO MISHIMA | HENRY SCOTT STOKES
Novelist, playwright, film actor, martial artist, and political commentator, Yukio Mishima (1925-1970) was arguably the most famous person in Japan at the time of his death. Henry Scott Stokes, one of Mishima’s closest friends, was the only non-Japanese allowed to attend the trial of the men involved in Mishima’s spectacular suicide. In this insightful and empathetic look at the writer, Stokes guides the reader through the milestones of Mishima’s meteoric and eclectic career and delves into the artist’s major works and themes. This biography skillfully and compassionately illuminates the achievements and disquieting ideas of a brilliant and deeply troubled man, an artist of whom Nobel Laureate Yasunari Kawabata had said, “A writer of Mishima’s caliber comes along only once every two or three hundred years.”