Natural Opium

Natural Opium PDF Author: Diane Johnson
Publisher: Knopf
ISBN:
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 264

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Book Description
"The widely acclaimed novelist, essayist, and cultural and social critic is one of the characters in these ten striking pieces, each of which is part memoir, part short story, part sharp observation of the world today." "This is a book about contemporary travelers in far-flung places, about the inner compulsion to travel, and about the condition of being a traveler. For the past ten years, Diane Johnson has roamed the world from Taipei to Tanzania to Teheran, from St. Petersburg and Bangkok to Delhi and the Great Barrier Reef. In these pieces she answers dramatically, and with a constantly refreshing wit, the question of why we travel and how travel changes us." "In Switzerland, the travelers' willingness to face danger in the name of adventure is made clear as a festive midnight toboggan ride turns into a terrifying slide through a pathless forest ... in London, the author's physician husband discovers that the patient whose life he is in the middle of saving is an international drug lord ... en route from her daughter's wedding in Paris to her son's in Taipei, the author glimpses a Russia she thought no longer existed." "Full of humor and with a nonstop storytelling pull, Natural Opium is a new kind of travel book, pure Diane Johnson."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Natural Opium

Natural Opium PDF Author: Diane Johnson
Publisher: Knopf
ISBN:
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 264

Get Book Here

Book Description
"The widely acclaimed novelist, essayist, and cultural and social critic is one of the characters in these ten striking pieces, each of which is part memoir, part short story, part sharp observation of the world today." "This is a book about contemporary travelers in far-flung places, about the inner compulsion to travel, and about the condition of being a traveler. For the past ten years, Diane Johnson has roamed the world from Taipei to Tanzania to Teheran, from St. Petersburg and Bangkok to Delhi and the Great Barrier Reef. In these pieces she answers dramatically, and with a constantly refreshing wit, the question of why we travel and how travel changes us." "In Switzerland, the travelers' willingness to face danger in the name of adventure is made clear as a festive midnight toboggan ride turns into a terrifying slide through a pathless forest ... in London, the author's physician husband discovers that the patient whose life he is in the middle of saving is an international drug lord ... en route from her daughter's wedding in Paris to her son's in Taipei, the author glimpses a Russia she thought no longer existed." "Full of humor and with a nonstop storytelling pull, Natural Opium is a new kind of travel book, pure Diane Johnson."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Opium for the Masses

Opium for the Masses PDF Author: Jim Hogshire
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781559501149
Category : Gardening
Languages : en
Pages : 132

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Book Description
"Opium. Known as 'The Mother of All Analgesics,' it's probably the greatest pain killer ever discovered. Opium is the parent of morphine, heroin, laudanum, Darvocet, Darvon, and many other pain relievers. Opium causes poets to rhapsodize and nations to go to war. 'Religion... is the opium of the people,' said Karl Marx, but some people insist on the real thing. In Opium for the Masses, Jim Hogshire tells you everything you want to know about the beloved poppy and its amazing properties [...] As he reveals the secrets of the seductive opium poppy, he tells the sad story of prescription drugs: doctors, drug makers and governments prohibiting natural remedies in favor of harsh synthetic derivatives. Opium for the Masses includes rare photographs and detailed illustrations that bring this magnificent plant to life."--From cover.

Opium Poppy Cultivation and Heroin Processing in Southeast Asia

Opium Poppy Cultivation and Heroin Processing in Southeast Asia PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Heroin
Languages : en
Pages : 44

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Book Description


Opium Fiend

Opium Fiend PDF Author: Steven Martin
Publisher: Villard
ISBN: 0345517857
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 417

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Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A renowned authority on the secret world of opium recounts his descent into ruinous obsession with one of the world’s oldest and most seductive drugs, in this harrowing memoir of addiction and recovery. A natural-born collector with a nose for exotic adventure, San Diego–born Steven Martin followed his bliss to Southeast Asia, where he found work as a freelance journalist. While researching an article about the vanishing culture of opium smoking, he was inspired to begin collecting rare nineteenth-century opium-smoking equipment. Over time, he amassed a valuable assortment of exquisite pipes, antique lamps, and other opium-related accessories—and began putting it all to use by smoking an extremely potent form of the drug called chandu. But what started out as recreational use grew into a thirty-pipe-a-day habit that consumed Martin’s every waking hour, left him incapable of work, and exacted a frightful physical and financial toll. In passages that will send a chill up the spine of anyone who has ever lived in the shadow of substance abuse, Martin chronicles his efforts to control and then conquer his addiction—from quitting cold turkey to taking “the cure” at a Buddhist monastery in the Thai countryside. At once a powerful personal story and a fascinating historical survey, Opium Fiend brims with anecdotes and lore surrounding the drug that some have called the methamphetamine of the nineteenth-century. It recalls the heyday of opium smoking in the United States and Europe and takes us inside the befogged opium dens of China, Thailand, Vietnam, and Laos. The drug’s beguiling effects are described in vivid detail—as are the excruciating pains of withdrawal—and there are intoxicating tales of pipes shared with an eclectic collection of opium aficionados, from Dutch dilettantes to hard-core addicts to world-weary foreign correspondents. A compelling tale of one man’s transformation from respected scholar to hapless drug slave, Opium Fiend puts us under opium’s spell alongside its protagonist, allowing contemporary readers to experience anew the insidious allure of a diabolical vice that the world has all but forgotten.

Opium for the Masses

Opium for the Masses PDF Author: Jim Hogshire
Publisher: Feral House
ISBN: 1936239019
Category : Gardening
Languages : en
Pages : 201

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Book Description
A practical guide to growing and using poppies and other botanical wonders.

Drugs and Narcotics in History

Drugs and Narcotics in History PDF Author: Roy Porter
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521585972
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 244

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Book Description
A collection of essays exploring the complex history of drugs and narcotics throughout historyfrom ancient Greece to the present dayshows that such substances were sought originally as healing agents, both within and without the medical profession. However, the mood- and mind-altering characteristics of some have led to the widespread abuse and legal controls we see today.

Opium Poppy

Opium Poppy PDF Author: L. Kapoor
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 9781560249238
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description
Here is an in-depth examination of the opium poppy--the first medicinal plant known to mankind. In Opium Poppy: Botany, Chemistry, and Pharmacology, author L. D. Kapoor provides readers with a comprehensive resource on poppy production from seed to alkaloid. He explores the opium poppy?s origin, distribution, chemistry, and uses and abuses from ancient civilizations through the present day. He covers plant and seed production and crop improvement and explores in detail the chemical and pharmaceutical by-products of the opium poppy. The book begins with a historical overview of the origin and use of opium poppy in ancient civilizations such as Greece, Egypt, and Mesopotamia. Chapters that follow contain detailed information on: botanical studies cytogenics and plant breeding agronomy, including insect and pest control measures physiological and anatomical studies chemical and pharmacological aspects of opium alkaloids biosynthesis and physiology of opium alkaloids the occurrence and role of alkaloids in plants the evaluation of analgesic actions of morphine in various pain models in experimental animals Opium Poppy: Botany, Chemistry, and Pharmacology is a useful reference for professionals and students of pharmacy, botany, chemistry, medicine, and pharmacology who need a better overall understanding of this ancient plant and its (potential) modern usage.

History of the Opium Problem

History of the Opium Problem PDF Author: Hans Derks
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004221581
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 851

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Book Description
Covering a period of about four centuries, this book demonstrates the economic and political components of the opium problem. As a mass product, opium was introduced in India and Indonesia by the Dutch in the 17th century. China suffered the most, but was also the first to get rid of the opium problem around 1950.

Opium’s Orphans

Opium’s Orphans PDF Author: P. E. Caquet
Publisher: Reaktion Books
ISBN: 1789145589
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
Upending all we know about the war on drugs, a history of the anti-narcotics movement’s origins, evolution, and questionable effectiveness. Opium’s Orphans is the first full history of drug prohibition and the “war on drugs.” A no-holds-barred but balanced account, it shows that drug suppression was born of historical accident, not rational design. The war on drugs did not originate in Europe or the United States, and even less with President Nixon, but in China. Two Opium Wars followed by Western attempts to atone for them gave birth to an anti-narcotics order that has come to span the globe. But has the war on drugs succeeded? As opioid deaths and cartel violence run rampant, contestation becomes more vocal, and marijuana is slated for legalization, Opium's Orphans proposes that it is time to go back to the drawing board.

Opium

Opium PDF Author: John H. Halpern
Publisher: Hachette Books
ISBN: 0316417653
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 331

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Book Description
From a psychiatrist on the frontlines of addiction medicine and an expert on the history of drug use comes the "authoritative, engaging, and accessible" history of the flower that helped to build (Booklist) -- and now threatens -- modern society. Opioid addiction is fast becoming the most deadly crisis in American history. In 2018, it claimed nearly fifty thousand lives -- more than gunshots and car crashes combined, and almost as many Americans as were killed in the entire Vietnam War. But even as the overdose crisis ravages our nation -- straining our prison system, dividing families, and defying virtually every legislative solution to treat it -- few understand how it came to be. Opium tells the "fascinating" (Lit Hub) and at times harrowing tale of how we arrived at today's crisis, "mak[ing] timely and startling connections among painkillers, politics, finance, and society" (Laurence Bergreen). The story begins with the discovery of poppy artifacts in ancient Mesopotamia, and goes on to explore how Greek physicians and obscure chemists discovered opium's effects and refined its power, how colonial empires marketed it around the world, and eventually how international drug companies developed a range of powerful synthetic opioids that led to an epidemic of addiction. Throughout, Dr. John Halpern and David Blistein reveal the fascinating role that opium has played in building our modern world, from trade networks to medical protocols to drug enforcement policies. Most importantly, they disentangle how crucial misjudgments, patterns of greed, and racial stereotypes served to transform one of nature's most effective painkillers into a source of unspeakable pain -- and how, using the insights of history, state-of-the-art science, and a compassionate approach to the illness of addiction, we can overcome today's overdose epidemic. This urgent and masterfully woven narrative tells an epic story of how one beautiful flower became the fascination of leaders, tycoons, and nations through the centuries and in their hands exposed the fragility of our civilization. An NPR Best Book of the Year"A landmark project." -- Dr. Andrew Weil"Engrossing and highly readable." -- Sam Quinones"An astonishing journey through time and space." -- Julie Holland, MD"The most important, provocative, and challenging book I've read in a long time." -- Laurence Bergreen