Created as a response to the American Constitution, Empire of the Senseless consists of three major chapters which can be read as opposing its core values “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. Beginning with ‘Elegy for the World of our Fathers’, Kathy Acker opens with a chapter based on ‘World of our Fathers' by Irving Howe. By means of this novel, which narrates the journey made by the East European Jews to America, she rewrites its tale into one of death.

The second main chapter, ‘Alone’ may be read as a metaphor for entrapment in its description of the love affair between Abhor and Thivai.

In the third chapter, her oppositional reading of the “pursuit of happiness” illustrates the self-destructive nature of Abhor and what I see as an interesting foreshadowing of Arabic transformations.

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