“Absolutely evil.” as my Rizal prof so bluntly put it, a man trained to dig his toes in the midline, and views academics in any form as objectively as possible. The title itself immediately struck my fancy, and with that cryptic remark by one of my mentors, my throat parched, and I sought out the nectar from the pages of this piece of text.
One day, After I pulling a lot of strings I managed to get hold of a copy of “The 48 laws of power” the author rung no bells, it was a typical soft bound, and nothing really stole my attention. But something stirred within me, remembering once more the words of my mentor, and the thirst that plagued me, these pages held the promise of something different from my usual repertoire of philosophy, satire, classical, and Zafran literature, and as I opened the crimson cover, the promise came to fruition. Like Eve, tasting the fruit of knowledge, I was suspended in an existential awareness that lingered long after the bookmark and been set and the book laid to rest. And even in my respite, as I dream, it haunts, pierces, and remakes this already corrupted soul. He wasn’t kidding, and reading the book felt like staring into a mirror and talking to myself.
The book utilizes the most primitive yet, most effective pedagogy known to man as vector for its boundless wisdom, learning by example. The reading the book feels like listening to your world history and social science professor spliced with the almost diabolical genius of Gracian, Machiavelli, and other wise men of old. The concept of “power” in the book is quite simple, its wanting something and utilizing any means to obtain it. Power is an entity that exists with physics, constants exist, and variables can be manipulated. For each law transgressions, observances, and reversals are cited in detail and more importantly the keys to utilizing a certain law is emphasized.
There’s no spoon feeding here, most of the people who read this book were uneasy with the concept of power mentioned in the text, and others simply lost interest and gave up out of boredom, brain cell burn out is what I like to call it. This book requires a certain level of both rational thinking and figurative thought to fully grasp the content and context of each law. The laws are so well detailed in fact that, most likely after finishing one law, one will be often left saying to oneself, “now there’s an idea.” As for application, well like a wise man once said, “power is in itself belligerent, for it will bend to any will, but will truly serve no master.”
Now as for the book being evil, perhaps, culture itself has equated power and its wielders as wicked, and the weak as righteous. Partially true, I have no grounds in arguing with culture itself but, the one law that governs all 48 is one unwritten in the book but is essential in each of the 48, it is the power over oneself. Good or evil will follow after that fact.
--graydarksoul--
