Opium: Reality's Dark Dream

by Thomas Dormandy

Is opium a vile curse on society, a blessed medicine from God, or possibly both? This fresh history offers surprising new insights.

Opium and its derivatives morphine and heroin have destroyed, corrupted, and killed individuals, families, communities, and even whole nations. And yet, for most of its long history, opium has also been humanity's most effective means of alleviating physical and mental pain. This extraordinary book encompasses the entire history of the world's most fascinating drug, from the first evidence of poppy cultivation by stone-age man to the present-day opium trade in Afghanistan. Dr. Thomas Dormandy tells the story with verve and insight, uncovering the strange power of opiates to motivate major conflicts yet also inspire great art and medical breakthroughs, to trigger the rise of global criminal networks yet also revolutionize attitudes toward well-being. Reality's Dark Dream traverses the globe and the centuries, exploring opium's role in colonialism, the Chinese Opium Wars, laudanum-inspired sublime Romantic poetry, American "Yellow Peril" fears, the rise of the Mafia and the black market, 1960s counterculture, and more. Dr. Dormandy also recounts exotic or sad stories of individual addiction. Throughout the book the author emphasizes opium's complex, valuable relationship with developments in medicine, health, and disease, highlighting the perplexing dual nature of the drug as both the cause and relief of great suffering in widely diverse civilizations.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Medicine, Addiction, Science, Microhistory, Drugs

376 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Thomas Dormandy was a retired consultant chemical pathologist and professor who worked at the University of Brunel and Whittington Hospital at the University of London. Dormandy wrote several books in addition to over three hundred scientific articles. In 1999 Dormandy published The White Death: A History of Tuberculosis. In it he combined scientific and sociological history to create his account of tuberculosis and various people's struggle with the disease primarily in the United States and Europe.

Reviews of The White Death were mixed among the critics. Muiris Houston, writing in the British Medical Journal, commented that Dormandy "has a knack of explaining technical matters" as he "weaves literature, social history, pharmacology, and epidemiology into an entertaining tale." In a Lancet review, Anne Hardy agreed that the book was "clearly written," but felt it "offers little to stimulate the interest of those already familiar with … the history of tuberculosis in general." Writing in the English Historical Review, Helen Jones thought the outline of the book was unclear. "There is no explanation at the outset of how the chapters are organized, and no sense of what will follow from chapter to chapter," Jones commented. A critic concluded in a Publishers Weekly review, however, that the "prodigious research and an anecdotal style blend to make this a fascinating foray into the history of medicine."

Reviews

[Newtown Review of Books · Rating 4 out of 5]

Remarkably, the huge amount of fascinating and sometimes technical information in the book is presented in prose that is witty, scarifying and compelling. Dormandy is a retired professor of chemical pathology, whatever that is, and he seems to have had a team of researchers, but only a superb command of language could have made the book the triumph it is.

Read full review here: http://newtownreviewofbooks.com/2012/...

[David Keith]

Opium has been a Godsend and also a anathema. Throughout history some for opium, some completely against opium. I feel after reading this well written account, that there must be some kind of medium ground sustained by professionals in the administration of opium. Heroin, Codeine, Morphine, Laudanum, etc, derivatives of the poppy should of course given to those as a last resort whom are in pain enough that opium should by all means given in whatever form deemed suitable. This Drug has been abused throughout it's discovered life span, and continues to be so. This abuse should be remedied, and that service freely available to all addicts. As I stated earlier, there remains some cases where these opiates should be administered by professionals in whatever form necessary. Opium relieves pain, no question, but remains highly addictive. Extreme caution should be taken when using this drug. Opium is a wonder, and good for some, properly taken it is a miracle drug, abused, it's a curse that will never go away.

[Richard Case · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent and a real history of the drug to its positive effect as pain killer to the more sinister addictive side

[David Ward · Rating 3 out of 5]

Opium: Reality's Dark Dream by Thomas Dormandy (Yale University Press 2012)(362.293) has written a a volume tracing the history of the opium poppy and its relationship with mankind since the paleolithic era. This was written by an MD and a historian, and it reads as such. My rating: 6/10, finished 11/9/12.

[Stuart Black · Rating 3 out of 5]

A huge investigation into opium and its widely used or abused derivatives, covering its production, impact on society, influence on the arts, associated wars, criminal gangs and innumerable other topics. If there is anything worth knowing about opium, morphine or heroin, aside from detailed pharmacology, it is in this book.