Página InicialGruposDiscussãoMaisZeitgeist
Pesquisar O Sítio Web
Este sítio web usa «cookies» para fornecer os seus serviços, para melhorar o desempenho, para analítica e (se não estiver autenticado) para publicidade. Ao usar o LibraryThing está a reconhecer que leu e compreende os nossos Termos de Serviço e Política de Privacidade. A sua utilização deste sítio e serviços está sujeita a essas políticas e termos.

Resultados dos Livros Google

Carregue numa fotografia para ir para os Livros Google.

A carregar...

The Pursuit of Oblivion: A Global History of Narcotics (2001)

por Richard Davenport-Hines

MembrosCríticasPopularidadeAvaliação médiaMenções
200Nenhum(a)134,738 (3.61)1
Davenport-Hines¿ landmark book draws on a dazzlingly wide range of sources to show how narcotics such as opium, morphine, cannabis, heroin, cocaine, amphetamine, LSD and ecstasy came to have such an impact on Western society and how, in turn, that society has attempted to cope with the arrival of each. Although it should become the standard account of the subject, this book is no dry academic tome: Davenport-Hines is one of the great historical story tellers and The Pursuit of Oblivion, though serious in purpose, contains a dazzling array of strange, amusing and macabre stories. It reveals the intimate drug habits of Sir Christopher Wren, Sir Walter Scott, Dickens, Gladstone, Freud, George IV, Queen Victoria, Marilyn Monroe, W. H. Auden and Anthony Eden (to name just a few); the role of enterprises such as the East India Company and Glaxo in distributing drugs (especially opiates); the part played by war in expanding drug use; the origins of the different policies of Britain and the United States, Holland and Switzerland, Thailand and Indonesia; the routes by which narcotics are transported around the world (including a brilliant account of the murderous career of the Colombian cocaine warlord, Pablo Escobar); and the evolution of attitudes towards, and taboos about, illicit substances. Spanning centuries, continents and empires, wars and revolutions, immigrants and aristocrats, The Pursuit of Oblivion neither celebrates nor condemns the use of narcotics. It concludes with an assessment of why, despite increasingly harsh sanctions, illegal drug use continues to increase and considers where law-makers go from here.… (mais)
Nenhum(a)
A carregar...

Adira ao LibraryThing para descobrir se irá gostar deste livro.

Ainda não há conversas na Discussão sobre este livro.

» Ver também 1 menção

Sem comentários
Because the book spans continents, millenniums and subjects, from the opium habit of Emperor Marcus Aurelius to the invention of hypodermic needles, the sheer volume of detail in ''The Pursuit of Oblivion'' makes it demanding to read. But it is an extremely impressive work, not just for its common-sense argumentation and encyclopedic breadth, but also because of Davenport-Hines's sharp eye for a good story.
 
Tem de autenticar-se para poder editar dados do Conhecimento Comum.
Para mais ajuda veja a página de ajuda do Conhecimento Comum.
Título canónico
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês. Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
Título original
Títulos alternativos
Data da publicação original
Pessoas/Personagens
Locais importantes
Acontecimentos importantes
Filmes relacionados
Epígrafe
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês. Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
History is the most dangerous concoction the chemistry of the mind has produced. Its properties are well known. It sets people dreaming, intoxicates them, engenders false memories, exaggerates their reflexes, keeps old wounds open, torments their leisure, inspires them with megalomania or persecution complex, and makes nations bitter, proud, insufferable and vain.
History can justify anything you like. It teaches strictly nothing, for it contains and gives examples of everything.
-Paul Valery, Regards sur le Monde Actuel
Hidden worlds haunt our imagination. The underworld of criminals; the Underground; the demi-monde (occupied in part by the inhabitants of polite society, wearing as it were, their Hyde aspects).
The world of the gods; Shangri La; Middle Earth; the world through the Looking-Glass.
The Mafia; the Establishment; the System; the great conspiracy of the left; the great conspiracy of the right.
Of these five apparently normal, respectable citizens, one is ruthless murderer who disemboweled Sir Toby with the ornamental Javanese paper-knife! - At once they all five became deep, interesting in their very uninterestingness.
-Michael Frayn, Constructions
The need to go astray, to be destroyed is an extremely private, distant, passionate turbulent truth, and has nothing to do with what we call substance.
-Georges Bataille, Le Coupable
Dedicatória
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês. Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
For AJH
Primeiras palavras
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês. Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
Mitsubishis, 007s, Doves, New Yorkers, California Sunrises, M&Ms, Dennis the Menances, Rhubarb and Custards, Snowballs, Blue Butterflies, McDonalds, Flatliners, Shamrocks, Swans, Swallows, Turbos, Phase Fours, Refreshers, Love Hearts, Riddlers, Pink Elephants - these are some of the alluring brand names of Ecstasy available on the illegal British drug market at the start of the twenty-first century. (Prologue)
In the 1670s an English merchant seamen called Thomas Bowrey (1649?-1713) was plying his trade along the coast of Bengal together with other English sailors.
Citações
Últimas palavras
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês. Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
(Carregue para mostrar. Atenção: Pode conter revelações sobre o enredo.)
Nota de desambiguação
Editores da Editora
Autores de citações elogiosas (normalmente na contracapa do livro)
Informação do Conhecimento Comum em inglês. Edite para a localizar na sua língua.
Língua original
DDC/MDS canónico
LCC Canónico

Referências a esta obra em recursos externos.

Wikipédia em inglês (3)

Davenport-Hines¿ landmark book draws on a dazzlingly wide range of sources to show how narcotics such as opium, morphine, cannabis, heroin, cocaine, amphetamine, LSD and ecstasy came to have such an impact on Western society and how, in turn, that society has attempted to cope with the arrival of each. Although it should become the standard account of the subject, this book is no dry academic tome: Davenport-Hines is one of the great historical story tellers and The Pursuit of Oblivion, though serious in purpose, contains a dazzling array of strange, amusing and macabre stories. It reveals the intimate drug habits of Sir Christopher Wren, Sir Walter Scott, Dickens, Gladstone, Freud, George IV, Queen Victoria, Marilyn Monroe, W. H. Auden and Anthony Eden (to name just a few); the role of enterprises such as the East India Company and Glaxo in distributing drugs (especially opiates); the part played by war in expanding drug use; the origins of the different policies of Britain and the United States, Holland and Switzerland, Thailand and Indonesia; the routes by which narcotics are transported around the world (including a brilliant account of the murderous career of the Colombian cocaine warlord, Pablo Escobar); and the evolution of attitudes towards, and taboos about, illicit substances. Spanning centuries, continents and empires, wars and revolutions, immigrants and aristocrats, The Pursuit of Oblivion neither celebrates nor condemns the use of narcotics. It concludes with an assessment of why, despite increasingly harsh sanctions, illegal drug use continues to increase and considers where law-makers go from here.

Não foram encontradas descrições de bibliotecas.

Descrição do livro
Resumo Haiku

Current Discussions

Nenhum(a)

Capas populares

Ligações Rápidas

Avaliação

Média: (3.61)
0.5
1
1.5
2 2
2.5
3 2
3.5
4 9
4.5 1
5

É você?

Torne-se num Autor LibraryThing.

 

Acerca | Contacto | LibraryThing.com | Privacidade/Termos | Ajuda/Perguntas Frequentes | Blogue | Loja | APIs | TinyCat | Bibliotecas Legadas | Primeiros Críticos | Conhecimento Comum | 203,214,900 livros! | Barra de topo: Sempre visível