How does the Apocalypse figure in politics, literature, and music, from the nineteenth century to now? From the end-of-time optimism of Robespierre and Marx, to Dostoyevsky’s skewering of radicalism in The Demons, Berlin’s stunning, post-Soviet staging of Wagner’s The Ring, Clint Eastwood’s film Unforgiven, and Cormac McCarthy’s bloody and desperate The Road, we explore the continuities and ruptures between our own apocalyptic fears and hopes, and the ancient visions from the Book of Daniel and St John’s Revelation. We read cultural treatments of the apocalypse along with philosophical accounts of the relation between violence and self-actualization, especially Hegel, Marx, Fanon, Girard, Eagleton.