“Vanity is an iron curtain cursed upon those who choose to wield it” So reads the last line in the foreword to Christopher Greenfield’s newly renowned Declaration of War. Influenced by the anti-normative likes of Charles Bukowski, the envisionary idealism of Albert Camus, the ruthless cultural critique of Friedrich Nietzsche, and the naturalism of David Hume, Greenfield calls into question via a series of short stories and poems the essential tenets of the human condition; what it means to truly be free, why we desire love and belonging, wherein hatred and bigotry are rooted when we seemingly desire quite the opposite, and the subliminal functions of power and authority that relentlessly work to keep us enslaved to our own primal self-destructive tendencies in the midst of a society that has far outgrown the need for them. Knowing first-hand what it’s like to be deemed the “black dog”, “rebel”, and the “heretic” of social circles, Christopher Greenfield was intrigued by the curious fascination of his friends and colleagues. The collection of works contained in the Declaration of War are based on real conversations, debates, and experiences that serve to allude to the grander image of human strife, will power, and the nature of one’s own suffering; that which, if able to be harnessed, may be used to create something beautiful... beyond the absurdity of the ‘superficial and mundane’.