Reading list

Critical Theory: Verso Student Reading

Our Critical Theory reading for the academic year ahead, featuring Erik Olin Wright, Terry Eagleton, Beverley Best, and more. Up to 40% off as part of our student reading sale.

Verso Books 2 September 2025

Back to University | Up to 40% off. Featured reading list: Student Reading - Essential Theory

Critique your critical theory reading with this crucial list of books, including Anna Kornbluh’s analysis of contemporary cultural style, Marx’s writings on Indigenous communism, and never forgetting Henri Lefebvre's richest, most prescient work about modern capitalism, without which your bookshelf weeps.

20% off when you order 2 books
30% off when you order 3 books
40% off when you order 4 or more books
Sale ends September 15th 2025 11:59pm ET
Discount applied at checkout.

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Critique of Everyday Life

by Henri Lefebvre

The three-volume text by Henri Lefebvre is perhaps the richest, most prescient work about modern capitalism to emerge from one of the twentieth century's greatest philosophers and is now availabl...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $44.95
Leaving the Twentieth Century

by McKenzie Wark

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...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $29.95
Marxist Modernism

by Gillian Rose

Afterword by Martin Jay

Edited by James Gordon Finlayson and Robert Lucas Scott

Marxist Modernism is a comprehensive yet concise and conversational introduction to the Frankfurt School. It is also a new resource from one of the twentieth century’s most important philosophers: ...
Paperback

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A Social History of Analytic Philosophy

by Christoph Schuringa

Analytic philosophy is the leading form of philosophy in the English-speaking world. What explains its continued success? Christoph Schuringa argues that its enduring power can only be understood b...
Hardback

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The Automatic Fetish

by Beverley Best

The Automatic Fetish traces Marx’s analysis of capital, step by step, through the material compiled posthumously as the third volume of Capital. Identifying the critique of value as the central thr...
Paperback

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The Late Marx’s Revolutionary Roads

by Kevin B. Anderson

In his late writings, Marx went beyond the boundaries of capital and class in the Western European and North American contexts. Kevin Anderson carries out a systematic analysis of Marx’s Ethnologic...
Paperback

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Class, Crisis and the State

by Erik Olin Wright

The idea of “class interest”—the set of social objectives of a given class—has been well explored in socialist thought. But what about the ability to realize these objectives? The complex tension b...
Paperback

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Neither Vertical nor Horizontal

by Rodrigo Nunes

A decade ago, a wave of mass mobilisations described as “horizontal” and “leaderless” swept the planet, holding the promise of real democracy and justice for the 99%. Many saw its subsequent ebb as...
Paperback

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Mute Compulsion

by Søren Mau

Despite insoluble contradictions, intense volatility and fierce resistance, the crisis-ridden capitalism of the 21st century lingers on. To understand capital’s paradoxical expansion and entrenchme...
Paperback

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Immediacy, or The Style of Too Late Capitalism

by Anna Kornbluh

Contemporary cultural style boosts transparency and instantaneity. These are values absorbed from our current economic conditions of "disintermediation": cutting out the middleman. Like Uber, but f...
Paperback

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How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century

by Erik Olin Wright

Capitalism has transformed the world and increased our productivity, but at the cost of enormous human suffering. Our shared values equality and fairness, democracy and freedom, community and solid...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $16.95
Walter Benjamin

by Terry Eagleton

This momentous study of Benjamin’s critical practice marks a sea change in Eagleton’s thought. Its goal is not merely to contemplate Benjamin’s approach to language, history, and art but to chart a...
Paperback

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Sensoria

by McKenzie Wark

As we face the compounded crises of late capitalism, environmental catastrophe and technological transformation, who are the thinkers and the ideas who will allow us to understand the world we live...
Paperback

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Reading Capital

by Louis Althusser, Étienne Balibar, Roger Establet, Pierre Macherey and Jacques Rancière

Translated by Ben Brewster and David Fernbach

Originally published in 1965, Reading Capital is a landmark of French thought and radical theory, reconstructing Western Marxism from its foundations. Louis Althusser, the French Marxist philosophe...
Paperback

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The Left Hemisphere

by Razmig Keucheyan

Translated by Gregory Elliott

As the crisis of capitalism unfolds, the need for alternatives is felt ever more intensely. The struggle between radical movements and the forces of reaction will be merciless. A crucial battlefiel...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $22.95

Marx: Towards the Centre of Possibility

by Kojin Karatani

Introduction by Gavin Walker

Edited by Gavin Walker

Translated by Gavin Walker

Originally published in 1974, Kojin Karatani’s Marx: Towards the Centre of Possibility has been among his most enduring and pioneering works in critical theory. Written at a time when the political...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $24.95

How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century

by Erik Olin Wright

Capitalism has transformed the world and increased our productivity, but at the cost of enormous human suffering. Our shared values equality and fairness, democracy and freedom, community and solid...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $16.95

Dark Matter

by Richard Langston

Collaborators for more than four decades, lawyer, author, filmmaker, and multimedia artist Alexander Kluge and social philosopher Oskar Negt are an exceptional duo in the history of Critical Theory...
Paperback

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Splinters in Your Eye

by Martin Jay

Although successive generations of the Frankfurt School have attempted to adapt Critical Theory to new circumstances, the work done by its founding members continues in the twenty-first century to ...
Paperback

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Capital Is Dead

by McKenzie Wark

In this radical and visionary new book, McKenzie Wark argues that the all-pervasive presence of data in our networked society has given rise to a new mode of production, one not ruled over by capit...
Hardback

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Postmodernism

by Fredric Jameson

In his most wide-ranging and accessible work, Fredric Jameson argues that postmodernism is the cultural response to the latest systemic change in world capitalism. He seeks here to crystallize a de...
Paperback

We are sorry this title is currently out of stock in your selected territory. Please check back or contact us for more information.

Critique of Everyday Life

by Henri Lefebvre

The three-volume text by Henri Lefebvre is perhaps the richest, most prescient work about modern capitalism to emerge from one of the twentieth century's greatest philosophers and is now availabl...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $44.95

Precarious Life

by Judith Butler

In her most impassioned and personal book to date, Judith Butler responds in this profound appraisal of post-9/11 America to the current US policies to wage perpetual war, and calls for a deeper un...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $17.95

General Intellects

by McKenzie Wark

What happened to the public intellectuals that used to challenge and inform us? Who is the Sartre or De Beauvoir of the internet age? General Intellects argues that we no longer have such singular ...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $26.95

Grand Hotel Abyss

by Stuart Jeffries

In 1923, a group of young radical German thinkers and intellectuals came together to at Victoria Alle 7, Frankfurt, determined to explain the workings of the modern world. Among the most prominen...
Paperback

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Dialectic of Enlightenment

by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer

Contributions by John Cumming

Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer are the leading figures of the Frankfurt School and this book is their magnum opus. Dialectic of Enlightenment is one of the most celebrated works of modern social...
Paperback

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Adorno, Foucault and the Critique of the West

by Deborah Cook

Adorno, Foucault, and the Critique of the West argues that critical theory continues to offer valuable resources for critique and contestation during this turbulent period in our history. To assess...
Paperback

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Foucault's Analysis of Modern Governmentality

by Thomas Lemke

Translated by Erik Butler

Lemke offers the most comprehensive and systematic account of Michel Foucault’s work on power and government from 1970 until his death in 1984. He convincingly argues, using material that has only ...
Paperback

Add to cart Sale price $29.95

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Critical Theory: Verso Student Reading

Critique of Everyday Life

Leaving the Twentieth Century

Marxist Modernism

A Social History of Analytic Philosophy

The Automatic Fetish

The Late Marx’s Revolutionary Roads

Class, Crisis and the State

Neither Vertical nor Horizontal

Mute Compulsion

Immediacy, or The Style of Too Late Capitalism

How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century

Walter Benjamin

Sensoria

Reading Capital

The Left Hemisphere

Marx: Towards the Centre of Possibility

How to Be an Anticapitalist in the Twenty-First Century

Dark Matter

Splinters in Your Eye

Capital Is Dead

Postmodernism

Critique of Everyday Life

Precarious Life

General Intellects

Grand Hotel Abyss

Dialectic of Enlightenment

Adorno, Foucault and the Critique of the West

Foucault's Analysis of Modern Governmentality

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