Putin through the lens of Columbine

Book excerpt: A first impression of Putin through the lens of Columbine may be that it displays an unhealthy recall of the Columbine High School massacre, as a singular and horrible event that deserves consignment to the past. The view is probable that this should be the case especially for the two perpetrators. There are grounds, however, for suggesting that Columbine may have been a peculiarly and even uniquely resonant event: the blood-event in which a focused, articulate, and unapologetic will to destruction of the human world both announced itself to the world and entered it. What is offered here is a reading of archives that begins with recognition of a syntax of resemblance between two performative mass murderers with big ambitions: Eric Harris and Vladimir Putin. The text organizes thought in an unusual way, drawing in method from David Hume and Gilles Deleuze as will be credited. A reader accustomed to the usual bandwidth of both public and academic discourse is asked to set aside expectations and proceed with an open mind.