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The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World Paperback – 28 May 2002
by
Michael Pollan
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The book that helped make Michael Pollan, the New York Times bestselling author of How to Change Your Mind, Cooked and The Omnivore’s Dilemma, one of the most trusted food experts in AmericaEvery schoolchild learns about the mutually beneficial dance of honeybees and flowers: The bee collects nectar and pollen to make honey and, in the process, spreads the flowers’ genes far and wide. In The Botany of Desire, Michael Pollan ingeniously demonstrates how people and domesticated plants have formed a similarly reciprocal relationship. He masterfully links four fundamental human desires—sweetness, beauty, intoxication, and control—with the plants that satisfy them: the apple, the tulip, marijuana, and the potato. In telling the stories of four familiar species, Pollan illustrates how the plants have evolved to satisfy humankind’s most basic yearnings. And just as we’ve benefited from these plants, we have also done well by them. So who is really domesticating whom?
- Print length304 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherRandom House Trade Paperbacks
- Publication date28 May 2002
- Dimensions13.21 x 1.65 x 20.27 cm
- ISBN-100375760393
- ISBN-13978-0375760396
- Lexile measure1350L
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Product description
About the Author
Michael Pollan is the author of seven books, including Cooked: The Natural History of Transformation, Food Rules, In Defense of Food, and The Omnivore’s Dilemma. A longtime contributor to The New York Times, he is also the Knight Professor of Science and Environmental Journalism at the University of California, Berkeley. In 2010, Time magazine named him one of the one hundred most influential people in the world.
Product details
- Publisher : Random House Trade Paperbacks; 1st edition (28 May 2002)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 304 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0375760393
- ISBN-13 : 978-0375760396
- Item Weight : 227 g
- Dimensions : 13.21 x 1.65 x 20.27 cm
- Best Sellers Rank: #40,924 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #21 in Botany
- #23 in Gardening & Landscape Design
- #372 in Biology Books
- Customer Reviews:
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Michael Pollan is the author of seven previous books, including Cooked, Food Rules, In Defense of Food, The Omnivore's Dilemma and The Botany of Desire, all of which were New York Times bestsellers. A longtime contributor to the New York Times Magazine, he also teaches writing at Harvard and the University of California, Berkeley. In 2010, TIME magazine named him one of the one hundred most influential people in the world.
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4.6 out of 5 stars
4.6 out of 5
1,191 global ratings
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Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 12 August 2021
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Good quality pages but it took more than a month in reaching me even with prime.. So order early if you want.
One person found this helpful
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Reviewed in India 🇮🇳 on 5 June 2019
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This is an amazing book and gave me new perspectives towards the world
3 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries
Lady Fancifull
5.0 out of 5 stars
Desire for beauty, sustenance, and intoxication - a meditation on plants and man,
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 20 June 2010Verified Purchase
This is the second book by Michael Pollan that I've read within a week (the excellent In Defence of Food: The Myth of Nutrition and the Pleasures of Eating: An Eater's Manifesto being the other)
He has the most magical, open mind; the ability to take the everyday and look at it like a true artist - thus forcing the reader to look anew at his/her own everyday.
Here, he looks at four plant species whose development and spread has been closely linked with Homo sapiens - the apple, the tulip, the cannabis plant and the potato, and considers the evolutionary advantage from the plant perspective. The book uncovers history, folk-law, economics, politics and much more.
Pollan delivers much fascinating information and has the lightest and most passionately engaged of writing styles. He is a wonderful raconteur. I read this book with a wider and wider smile, thoroughly delighted and enchanted.
This book reminded me in many ways of Anatomy of a Rose: The Secret Life of Flowers by Sharman Apt Russell. Both authors have the ability to be fascinatingly informative whilst simultanously managing charm, entertainment, profound thought and beauty.
Both effortlessly illustrate Blake's:
To see a world in a grain of sand
And A heaven In a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity In the Palm of Your Hand
And eternity in an hour
They are writers who can take the mundane, and open it to deep meaning, philosophical complexity and education
A small factual teaser from the tulip section - the most prized and valuable tulips were those variegated by fine filagrees of crimson patterning upon the primary colour base. But this was caused by the presence of a virus, so over time, plants grown from bulblets broken off from the 'parent' bulb would grow weaker and weaker - so increasing the rarity and fabulous cost of the prized variety. The evolutionary gainer from mans' 'meddling', not the tulip, but the virus, which we disseminated!
He has the most magical, open mind; the ability to take the everyday and look at it like a true artist - thus forcing the reader to look anew at his/her own everyday.
Here, he looks at four plant species whose development and spread has been closely linked with Homo sapiens - the apple, the tulip, the cannabis plant and the potato, and considers the evolutionary advantage from the plant perspective. The book uncovers history, folk-law, economics, politics and much more.
Pollan delivers much fascinating information and has the lightest and most passionately engaged of writing styles. He is a wonderful raconteur. I read this book with a wider and wider smile, thoroughly delighted and enchanted.
This book reminded me in many ways of Anatomy of a Rose: The Secret Life of Flowers by Sharman Apt Russell. Both authors have the ability to be fascinatingly informative whilst simultanously managing charm, entertainment, profound thought and beauty.
Both effortlessly illustrate Blake's:
To see a world in a grain of sand
And A heaven In a Wild Flower
Hold Infinity In the Palm of Your Hand
And eternity in an hour
They are writers who can take the mundane, and open it to deep meaning, philosophical complexity and education
A small factual teaser from the tulip section - the most prized and valuable tulips were those variegated by fine filagrees of crimson patterning upon the primary colour base. But this was caused by the presence of a virus, so over time, plants grown from bulblets broken off from the 'parent' bulb would grow weaker and weaker - so increasing the rarity and fabulous cost of the prized variety. The evolutionary gainer from mans' 'meddling', not the tulip, but the virus, which we disseminated!
17 people found this helpful
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars
Amazing!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 13 February 2017Verified Purchase
I picked up this book from the library at my university. I kept having the extend the loan of the book because i never wanted to give it back. However, I took it back and bought one of my own i was enjoying it that much. Pollan is clearly a beautiful writer, with encapsulating expressions and way of describing things. I built a great awareness of Pollan as a person, as a gardener, as well as his and other speculations of certain plants. It is one of the best books ive read in a very, very long time. I actually read the whole thing, which is a first for me with books!
Definitely recommend this to anyone.
Definitely recommend this to anyone.
4 people found this helpful
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TommyMthom
3.0 out of 5 stars
This book is very interesting, but does not live ...
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 9 October 2015Verified Purchase
This book is very interesting, but does not live up to its description. If you want to find out a lot about the history in the US of potatoes, tulips, apples, cannabis then go for it
5 people found this helpful
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lucy
5.0 out of 5 stars
I really loved reading this book
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 26 July 2016Verified Purchase
I really loved reading this book... Lots of interesting points and it was fun to discover things I didn't know about such well known plants. I enjoyed the narration, personal and humerous at times!
One person found this helpful
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Martha Blount
5.0 out of 5 stars
... book - thanks for sending another copy - very good service from this seller - thank you
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on 18 October 2015Verified Purchase
Interesting and informative book - thanks for sending another copy - very good service from this seller - thank you !







