Nicotine Lady -- The Cultural History of Tobacco: The Cultural History of Tobacco

Author: Ian Gatling
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-01-01
Features: Why Smoke? I unconsciously recalled my habits when I was in my teens. At that time, I lived in Hong Kong, where smoking was a common occurrence, like an instinct rather than a habit. I first began to consider this question while traveling with a non-smoking friend in southeastern China. She came from the ancient civilizations of South America, charming, exhilarating, yet full of deception and hidden danger; she had been loved, hated, and banned, yet still possessed too much allure; she posed as a witch, as a healer, but was actually just a deadly poison. From the Andes Mountains to outer space, from magical elixirs to fashion symbols, from spiritual messengers to sexual mediums, from the wrath of tyrants to the preferences of presidents, from global currencies to health killers—was she a sorceress or a butcher? Was she inspiring people or enslaving them? This book takes you into the world of the "Nicotine Maiden" and tells the story of the most widely consumed and highest-taxed lethal substance on our planet—tobacco.