Cooking Light Subscription: Anarchy Cookbook

Anarchy Cookbook

The Anarchist Cookbook, first published in 1971,[1] is a book that contains instructions for the manufacture of explosives, rudimentary telecommunications phreaking devices, and other items. It was written by William Powell to protest United States involvement in the Vietnam War.[2]Since writing the book, Powell has converted to Anglican Christianity and has attempted to have the book removed from circulation.[3] When the book was published by Lyle Stuart, the copyright was taken out in the publisher's name, not his, and the current publisher had no desire to remove the book from print. Powell has since created many websites devoted to the book, explaining his desire to see it removed from circulation[2] as he no longer advocates what he had written. He wrote on one of those websites:The book, in many respects, was a misguided product of my adolescent anger at the prospect of being drafted and sent to Vietnam to fight in a war that I did not believe in.[3]At the time of its publication, one Federal Bureau of Investigation memo described The Anarchist Cookbook as "one of the crudest, low-brow, paranoiac writing efforts ever attempted."[4]

In 2009 the magazine Vice published a brief history of the book as well as excerpted recipes. The agazine's associate network, VBS.tv, also broadcast a documentary on the subject.[5]In 2010, the Federal Bureau of Investigation released the bulk of its investigative file on The Anarchist Cookbook.[6]In 2007.