#title In Praise of The Unabomber #author Christopher Doda #date 2002 #source From the book *Larger Than Life*, published by Black Moss Press (Windsor, Ont.). #lang en #pubdate 2025-08-27T01:02:03 #topics poetry, celebrity, #notes The title is satirical and the quotes fictitious. *** Part One The Critics Agree: “A fireworks exhibition of fantasy, sexual love, and moral awareness.” —The New York Times Book Review “The essay’s devastatingly sustained black irony stands comparison with Swift’s A Modest Proposal. It is, I think, the Unabomber’s finest achievement to date.” —The Financial Times “One of the ten best works of the decade...dazzling... fantastic and poetically convincing... The Unabomber has managed to seize the strands of actuality and transform them into a fabulous tale.” —Time “... enormous fun... The Unabomber has found a fresh way to orchestrate the themes of American innocence, energy, and inchoate ambition... A remarkable achievement.” —Newsweek “The effect is a cross between a long scream, a nervous breakdown and a Tacitean indictment of a regime.” —The London Times *** Part Two There are, of course, easier ways to get published but few quite as innovative The Times and the Post are nothing to scoff at and he was the only writer to be on People’s 25 most interesting list that year His friends and relatives often wondered about him so concerned with letters What a strange character they would say an even stranger sentence to pronounce Beneath the sagging roof the stylist has taken shelter in the unlikely guise of a bitter failure in order to elude the FBI and other censorship agencies Now tried and convicted for beliefs so dangerous not even PEN International dare write letters on his behalf *** Part Three FBI Profile of the Disgruntled Scribbler: He would most likely be a loner with few ties to family or loved ones. Probably has travelled extensively in the country of his origin but rarely outside of it. Would travel alone and avoid open, crowded areas, almost always preferring movement after nightfall. Uncomfortable in the glare of headlights. Excessively jealous and possessive, and highly demanding of acquaintances and lovers. Likely to have come from a broken home with uncertain, or illegitimate, parentage. Severe anti-establishment tendencies. Talks to a presence who is not there and frequently complains of voices or other people living in his head. Overactive imagination with a tendency to hyper-focus. Better at division than multiplication. Plagued by feelings of uselessness masked by an excessive, almost comic, egotism. Severe feelings of persecution allow him justification for his actions. Devours the world with the senses, a state where everyone is a part of the search for wholeness, for balance, for order, and rebirth. Is attracted to images of women in jeopardy. Picks his targets on the basis of their usefulness to him. He seeks to own them, ingest some parts of them so as to claim their spirit, or essence, as a trophy. Does not believe in coincidence but is willing to exploit it. Most likely, he is a failure. *** Part Four Under his hands things take shape pieces put together connections made forms found tight and intricate The smaller he makes it the bigger it breaks the better it scatters He hears an engine all around him chugging out a juggernaut mantra makeitnewmakeitnewmakeitnewmakeitnew and he digs in futile heels against it demands that we go beyond modern by burning backwards into the past It is essential contra-diction to use such stunning technique to protest technology like writing words to reveal the instability of language Theory driven, university driven out, a mind warped by perception before observation; the cart before the horse, roof without foundation It is easy then to become the sort of writer who sees the world as a series of targets Rarely, he would think of how all this might be received, how people will react (new ideas always finding resistance) and if his works will earn him a part of history from a time that passed him by, before addressing his latest piece of Black mail and sending another small package of chaos into an orderly world.