Customer Reviews

Writing on Drugs

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Overall, I found "Writing on Drugs" interesting, in that it not only covered how various writers have written about, and on, various drugs, but also how the use of drugs -- legal or otherwise -- have shaped our society. However, the book was poorly organized, with the author jumping from topic to topic without any transition or explanation. The editors didn't help much -- the layout of the book is such that the reader cannot easily discern when one chapter has ended and the next has begun. Finally, Ms. Plant failed to give specific sources for her information. Yes, there is a list of references, but within the text, one cannot tell where she got her information. This is especially disconcerting when she goes on about the CIA involvement in drugs. I don't necessarily dispute the accuracy, but when someone makes such damning statements in public, she'd better be able to back them up, or risk losing credibility.

In the final analysis, I'd recommend waiting for the paperback.

Sadie Plant--and I enjoy the inevitability of her name--has delved into the world of drugs, but she has seemingly fallen prey to the same lack of focus and inability to grasp any essential truths that haunted the writers of whom she (sometimes) writes. As she eloquently puts it, "Writing on drugs has evolved and mutated like a contagion, each writer reading the others' work, repeating their adventures, amd also their mistakes, endlessly rehearsing the same refrain." Indeed. And Ms. Plant has continued this somewhat dubious trend.

This really is a book without boundaries--and it could use some. Does "Writing on Drugs" refer to writing under the influence of them or simply writing about them after use? (Or just writing about them, period?) Is it actually about writers? If so, why are we treated to insights like the fact that Hitler received injections of speed daily or that Coca-Cola was developed from a wine first produced by John Pemberton? Is it actually about literature? If so, why then so much on Freud who, as far as I know, never thought of himself as a "literary" figure, nor spent time writing about literary figures? And then we have three or four closing chapters that have absolutely nothing to do with writers, writing, or literature. They are interesting in many ways but beg the question, Just what is the focus of this manuscript anyway?

If ever there was a book in search of a ham-fisted editor, this would be it. Ms. Plant has been given leeway to fairly much make any connections she pleases about drug use and how it has infilitrated our modern society and consciousness, and in many ways I applaud her efforts and her skill as a writer/researcher. But, please, if that is her aim--to tie together as many strands as possible--let's not market the book to the public under the title of "Writing on Drugs," unless that title is to suggest that "on" means "about" and that anything but the bong and the Hendrix T-shirt can be tossed in. I mean, the marketers clearly call this an "exhilarating literary exploration."

That said, I think the book pursues its many subjects with a gleeful brio and a fine-tuned sense of inquiry. I learned quite a bit from these pages. There were some literary insights from writers as diverse as Artaud, Coleridge, Nin, Stevenson, Michaux, Cocteau, and Paz. (Unfortunately, they are countered by continual references to Lewis Carroll and that Master of Junk, William Burroughs, which seem almost beneath Ms. Plant's abilities. And, please, why so much discussion of DeQuincey, a footnote in literature at the very best?) There are chapters on the structure of the human brain, which makes it so susceptible to drug ingestion; the economics of the drugs from the eighteen century to the present day; a history of opium that for once and for all made some sense to me of why we had the First and Second Opium Wars, something no textbook ever did.

This book gave me the sense of two people peaking on LSD, both brains awhir, both trying to express to the other the mulititude of impressions, feelings, colors, and sensations coursing through their neurons, and neither really ever having a chance because communication in such extreme circumstances is a suspect business at best. If Sadie wants the reader to understand drugs and their place in literature (or society) better, perhaps she needs to drop the metaphor and method of dope and write instead in a more sober, focused fashion.

a moving , eloquently written story about the plants that shape humankind. This work reads like a journalistic overview of the subject as opposed to a penetrating scientific discourse, which is refreshing.

It's more of a readable, easily digestible (pardon the pun) work for a general audience. Other works on the topic are more detailed but few are as accessible and enjoyable.

Well done.

Disjointed, disconnected, and shrouded in mystery all seem to be themes which surround drugs, whether one is speaking of their history, their effects, or their economics and regulation. Sadie Plant attempts to connect and demystify many of the areas of this subject in her book Writing on Drugs. Throughout the book, Plant tries to tie the various areas that fall under the subject of psychoactive drugs together with an underlying theme of the effect which psychoactive drug use has on authoring literature, but she fails to consistently connect this theme to all of the areas which she covers. The result is that the quality of the book is greatly diminished, and starkly contrasts with her very apparent writing, researching, and connective abilities. The book does provide useful insight into its subject, and should be enjoyable to readers interested in psychoactive drugs, modern sociocultural history, or literary creativity. Through its various historical perspectives, it has provided me with a better understanding of psychoactive drugs and their wide-ranging effects, and in spite of the confusion which sometimes results from its inconsistent theme, I recommend this book to those readers with a little time and a desire for an information-packed introduction to psychoactive drugs.

This is a coauthored review by one who recommends this book and one who does not. Both Rendi and I have read this book and whereas I found this book to be little more than annoying, Rendi enjoyed it. We realize that some readers may appreciate this book for the same reasons that Rendi enjoyed it and other readers may regret purchasing this book for the same reasons that I did. I had thought of a good way to explain why I did not appreciate this book and as it turns out this also a good explanation of why Rendi enjoyed it.

Imagine two people have bought tickets to a college lecture entitled "Writing on Drugs" which, as the title suggests, was supposed to be about historic (non-medical) literature concerning and/or inspired by psychoactive drugs and the influence of this literature and the drugs themselves on Western culture and world economics in the last few hundred years.

One person had been trying to collect information on the historic literature on drugs and was in need of some sort of professional chronology of this literature. Armed with a note pad and pen, ready to take notes, this person was hoping to get some good information; authors, titles, publishing dates, and so on. The other person, being much less detail-oriented, was simply hoping to enjoy a good talk on this subject.

In the actual lecture, the speaker seemed quite knowledgeable about the topic but unable or unwilling to present her knowledge with any sense of order, consistency or focus. Rather, she rambled on and meandered off track for most of the talk spending only a small portion of the time actually discussing literature pertaining to drugs. It seemed as if she had the potential to give a good, orderly talk on the topic but showed up too high to do so. The person took few notes because little note-worthy information was given and half way through he put down his pen and pad in disgust. The other person sat back and enjoyed the meandering off-topic ramble for what it was - interesting.

This book is parallel to this hypothetical lecture by the seemingly stoned hypothetical lecturer. Depending on what you would hope to get from a book entitled "Writing on Drugs", you may or may not like this book.

I, for one, was hoping for dates, authors and book titles; not necessarily in a tight chronological order, but I hoped that I could at least gain some sort of orderly (even if only partial) list after taking notes and arranging them to my suiting. But Plant often gives authors without book titles and book titles without dates or even any indication of what era the works of literature were written or published in. Inexcusably, quotes are given without sources in the main text or even in notes. How can one quote a book without giving an author or book title?

Plant is also frustratingly inconsistent. As one would expect, she discusses DeQuincey, Coleridge, Ellis, Ludlow and others. But she gives only scant mentions of Huxley and other important authors, little more than tenuously relevant quotes from William S. Burroughs, and neglects to mention the likes of Hunter S. Thompson's semi-fictional "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" and Tom Wolfe's "Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test". If she considers Freud's professional works on cocaine to be within the scope of this book, why not crucial works of Richard E. Schultes, R. Gordon Wasson and the like? Leary, Metzner and Alpert's ground-breaking book "The Psychedelic Experience" is mentioned, but what about the important works of Huston Smith, Stan Groff, Jonathan Ott and many others? If she can astutely mention the obscure historical fact that the occultist Aleister Crowley administered mescaline to the audience of his theatrical ritual "Rites of Eleusis" then why not his seminal essays on hashish? What about Terence McKenna's "Food of the Gods"? Why not Ram Das' "Be Here Now"? If Plant misses or declines to mention so many books that I only chanced upon by browsing through mainstream book stores, then how many more books has she missed or declined to mention? I shudder to think, especially because I paid good money for her "Writing on Drugs". Perhaps she should have titled it "Random and Incomplete Discussions of Writings on Drugs and Other Loosely Related Topics".

There is also a lack of focus in this book. Plant discusses some of what Sigmund Freud wrote concerning cocaine and how his use of cocaine deeply effected his formulation of his thinking on psychology, which in was a huge influence of psychology as a whole. But then she goes on to discuss psychology in general and for too long. Interesting, but off-topic. She also discusses the neurological mechanics of how some drugs work in the brain, the economics of the opium trade in the colonial era, the evolution of drug prohibition, and other topics related to drugs but only loosely related to literature or else not related at all. Again, perhaps this book should have been publicized as a work on drugs and civilization and other loosely related topics, not as a book concerning literature on drugs.

Indeed, I jokingly voiced the question of whether the book title indicates that its subject is about literate pertaining to drugs or that it is a book written by an author while on drugs. It reads like a book on the literature of drugs written by an author while on drugs. Unlike a lecturer who perhaps got too stoned just before their talk and who blew a single chance at giving a good speaking engagement, an author cannot give the same excuse. A book takes considerable time to write and the author has the chance to rework, rewrite, revise and edit their manuscript while sober. Unless an author has a problem ever being sober, I can see no excuse why a non-fiction book should be sent to press in such a form. Many musicians have particular nights where they put on a bad concert because of they were too drunk that or high, but the same excuse can not be used to explain a bad album created over months of different recording sessions.

I would give this book 2 out of 5 stars. But to be fair, Rendi will now give his opinion...

Unlike Justin, I enjoyed this book. Justin is more detail oriented - he reads exclusively non-fiction literature and he reads to learn - so I can understand how such a reader would be frustrated by Sadie Plant's presentation. I, on the other hand, read for enjoyment and found this book to be very interesting. I also have learned a lot that I did not expect to get out of a book on drug literature. In his "Food of the Gods" Terence McKenna discusses, among other things, the role of the opium trade on the economics and politics of the colonial era but in this book Plant goes into much more gratifying detail of this underplayed aspect of history.

Plant also goes into some detail about a number of other interesting subtopics related to drugs in history. I had heard that speed was used by the Third Reich and had wondered if Hitler was a speed freak. But I did not know that soldiers and leaders on both sides of the war used so much speed, making rash, aggressive and paranoid decisions with the lives of so many mortals. Many of us know that Coca-Cola originally contained cocaine but Plant gives us a good bit of the history of Coca-Cola, cocaine and the gradual withdrawal of cocaine from their formula just before there were legal restrictions on the drug. She also talks about the widespread use of opium, cannabis and other drugs in cough syrup, "medicine" to quiet teething babies, and so on.

I would imagine there are other books that go into more detail on this, but I found Plant's chapters the hidden politics of cocaine and heroin to be fascinating. I had read hints about the sordid webs of secret underhanded dealings involving U.S. government agencies, foreign drug cartels and corrupt governments, the United Nations, the Taliban, Vietnam, Laos, the Iran-Contra scandal, and so on but in this book Plant goes into enough detail to clarify but not bore a reader such as myself. I, for one, did not know that the Taliban got much of it's money from heroin derived from the poppy fields in Afghanistan - though I should have suspected. After reading this book I wonder if, like Vietnam, the invasion of Afghanistan had a lot to do with taking over poppy fields for the lucrative heroin black market than for the idealistic reasons the American public swallows hook, line and sinker.

If I were to attend that hypothetical lecture, I would have relaxed, sat back and listened with interest while Justin sat there feeling a bit cheated out of his money. Justin is right when he says that only a portion of this book pertains to literature about drugs but I thought it was a good read anyway. I recommend it. I would give it 4 out of 5 stars.

Since Justin gives it 2 stars and I give it 4, we will average this to 3 stars.

i read a lot of books, and hate most of them. this one was actually really good.

multi-faceted, doesnt try too hard, just uncovered some rich material between the overlaps of the things. very well done.