To live well in the world one must be able to enjoy it: to love, Freud says, and
work. Dejection is the state of being in which such enjoyment is no longer poss
ible. There is an aesthetic dimension to dejection, in which the world appears i
n a new light.
In this book, the dark serenity of dejection is examined through
a study of the poetry of Hopkins and Coleridge, and the music of 'depressive' b
lack metal artists such as Burzum and Xasthur. The author then develops a theory
of 'militant dysphoria' via an analysis of the writings of the Red Army Fractio
n's activist-theoretician, Ulrike Meinhof. The book argues that the 'cold world'
of dejection is one in which new creative and political possibilities, as well
as dangers, can arise.
