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Oct. 12th, 2011 01:33 pmI think it would probably be a fallacy to say I "finished reading" Michael Pollan's The Botany of Desire. I read a fair chunk of it, but not all.
It sounds like a great name for a literary novel or an arthouse film. Those of you who recognise his name, though, know that Pollan writes nonfiction about food, and in this case about plants. Which honestly I'm not that interested in eating, because most of them taste awful.
I've read Pollan's "The Omnivore's Dilemma" and loved it -- essentially that book is the reason I stopped eating fast food entirely, though more for ecologial reasons than health ones. And a basic part of the books he writes is that he experiences the research in them: if he's studying green or organic farming, he goes and hangs out with organic farmers. He also seems fond of dividing his books into four sections, which he did in this case: the apple as sweetness, the tulip as beauty, cannabis as intoxication, and potatoes as order (I think he fudged that last one a little by making it about genetically engineered potatoes, though). His basic thesis is that agriculture is as much about plants controlling us as it is about us controlling plants, and that every garden lies somewhere on a spectrum from Dionysiac disorder to Apollonian rigidity.
I think part of the problem with Botany Of Desire is that it's not really a book's worth of philosophy, and I think he kind of knows it, so he ends up including a lot of trivia and digression. Which I'd be okay with, I like both of those things, but they're not set into any linear kind of thought process. The progression of the book is irrational to the point of confusing, and I got kind of tired of just jumping from one anecdote to the next.
So I ended up reading all of The Apple and all of The Tulip, skimming Cannabis, and reading about half of The Potato. I think really if you're looking to read any of Michael Pollan's books, The Omnivore's Dilemma is the one. Unless you're really, really into gardening.
It sounds like a great name for a literary novel or an arthouse film. Those of you who recognise his name, though, know that Pollan writes nonfiction about food, and in this case about plants. Which honestly I'm not that interested in eating, because most of them taste awful.
I've read Pollan's "The Omnivore's Dilemma" and loved it -- essentially that book is the reason I stopped eating fast food entirely, though more for ecologial reasons than health ones. And a basic part of the books he writes is that he experiences the research in them: if he's studying green or organic farming, he goes and hangs out with organic farmers. He also seems fond of dividing his books into four sections, which he did in this case: the apple as sweetness, the tulip as beauty, cannabis as intoxication, and potatoes as order (I think he fudged that last one a little by making it about genetically engineered potatoes, though). His basic thesis is that agriculture is as much about plants controlling us as it is about us controlling plants, and that every garden lies somewhere on a spectrum from Dionysiac disorder to Apollonian rigidity.
I think part of the problem with Botany Of Desire is that it's not really a book's worth of philosophy, and I think he kind of knows it, so he ends up including a lot of trivia and digression. Which I'd be okay with, I like both of those things, but they're not set into any linear kind of thought process. The progression of the book is irrational to the point of confusing, and I got kind of tired of just jumping from one anecdote to the next.
So I ended up reading all of The Apple and all of The Tulip, skimming Cannabis, and reading about half of The Potato. I think really if you're looking to read any of Michael Pollan's books, The Omnivore's Dilemma is the one. Unless you're really, really into gardening.
