The Book of Absinthe: A Cultural History (Paperback)

by Phil Baker (Author) "What does absinthe mean?..." (more)
Key Phrases: absinthe museum, one absinthe, absinthe drinking, Van Gogh, New Orleans, Arthur Symons (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
La Fee Verte (or "The Green Fairy") has intoxicated artists, poets, and writers ever since the late eighteenth century. Stories abound of absinthe's druglike sensations of mood lift and inspiration due to the presence of wormwood, its infamous "special" ingredient, which ultimately leads to delirium, homicidal mania, and death. Opening with the sensational 1905 Absinthe Murders, Phil Baker offers a cultural history of absinthe, from its modest origins as an herbal tonic through its luxuriantly morbid heyday in the late nineteenth century. Chronicling a fascinatingly lurid cast of historical characters who often died young, the absinthe scrapbook includes Paul Verlaine, Arthur Rimbaud, Charles Baudelaire, Oscar Wilde, Ernest Dowson, Aleister Crowley, Arthur Machen, August Strindberg, Alfred Jarry, Vincent van Gogh, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Alphonse Allais, Ernest Hemingway, and Pablo Picasso. Along with discussing the rituals and modus operandi of absinthe drinking, Baker reveals the recently discovered pharmacology of how real absinthe actually works on the nervous system, and he tests the various real and fake absinthe products that are available overseas. The Book of Absinthe is a witty, erudite primer to the world's most notorious drink.

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Grove Press; First American Edition edition (July 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0802139930
• ISBN-13: 978-0802139931
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #328,063 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars cool and green, August 13, 2003

By	Boglin Books (Stanford) - See all my reviews

This is the best book on absinthe, even better than the Barnaby Conrad book - which is kind of 'coffee table' by comparison - even though it doesn't have any color pictures. It's more Gothic, more literary, and much funnier (in a black humor sort of way). There's a lot of stuff that isn't in Conrad at all, like Aleister Crowley, and good material on 1890s London.
I learnt a lot from this (but I probbaly won't remember it) because more than just the drink it's like an A-Z of decadence and high weirdness. And after that there's a guide to modern brands.
It also has the real pharmacology,and it exposes all that stuff about absinthe and cannabis as just plain wrong.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Viva La Fee Verte!, September 13, 2006

By	Samuel Wells "'Pataphysician, Absintheur" (Denver, CO) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

If you are interested in reading about the cultural and artistic history of the Green Fairy this book should be on your shelf right next to Barnaby Conrad's book. Baker has a fine sense of humor and narrative that fills the book with a memory of fin-de-siecle style decadence. Do yourself a favor, skip the Adams text, grab both this and Conrad and pour yourself a measure of liquid delight. You won't be sorry.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Everything you didn't know you wanted to know about Absinthe, August 23, 2006

By	Bryan Bowden "a salmagundi of a man" (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

What I like about this book is Baker's approach and all the information he gives the reader. I really enjoyed reading this book, and do, in fact, now know very much about absinthe. Baker covers: how it came about, how it influenced artists and thinkers, to how it became vilified. There are some great anictdotes about artist such as Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and their drinking habits that were laugh out loud funny.

I did not give the book 5 stars because it is so historical and filled with information that the book does sag a bit at points. But that does not take away terribly from the overall enjoyment I had reading it.