This Is Your Mind on Plants

Pollan, Michael

£20.00

Of all the many things humans rely on plants for, surely the most curious is our use of them to change consciousness: to stimulate, calm, or completely alter the qualities of our mental experience. In this book, Michael Pollan explores three very different drugs – opium, caffeine and mescaline – and throws the fundamental strangeness of our thinking about them into sharp relief. Exploring and participating in the cultures that have grown up around these drugs, while consuming (or in the case of caffeine, trying not to consume) them, Pollan reckons with the powerful human attraction to psychoactive plants, and the equally powerful taboos.

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Publish Date: 08/07/2021

Description

‘It’s a trip – engrossing, eye-opening, mind altering’ New Statesman

‘Fascinating. Pollan is the perfect guide … curious, careful, open minded’ The Guardian

From the international bestselling author of How to Change Your Mind comes a ground-breaking exploration of our relationship with natural drugs

Of all the many things humans rely on plants for, surely the most curious is our use of them to change consciousness: to stimulate, calm, or completely alter the qualities of our mental experience. In This Is Your Mind On Plants, Michael Pollan explores three very different drugs – opium, caffeine and mescaline – and throws the fundamental strangeness of our thinking about them into sharp relief. Exploring and participating in the cultures that have grown up around these drugs, while consuming (or in the case of caffeine, trying not to consume) them, Pollan reckons with the powerful human attraction to psychoactive plants, and the equally powerful taboos.

In a unique blend of history, science, memoir and reportage, Pollan shines a fresh light on a subject that is all too often treated reductively. In doing so, he proves that there is much more to say about these plants than simply debating their regulation, for when we take them into our bodies and let them change our minds, we are engaging with nature in one of the most profound ways we can. This ground-breaking and singular book holds up a mirror to our fundamental human needs and aspirations, the operations of our minds and our entanglement with the natural world.

Additional information

Weight 499 g
Dimensions 240 × 162 × 28 mm
Author

Publisher

Imprint

Cover

Hardback

Pages

320

Language

English

Edition
Dewey

615.788 (edition:23)

Readership

General – Trade / Code: K