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Press review for Emperors of Dreams : Drugs in the 19th century
"Mike Jay's absorbing book focuses on drug use during a period when the boundaries of science were being swept back and the exploits of explorers like David Livingstone regularly made news. One of its key strength is the way Jay never loses sight of this intrepid spirit; Emperors of Dreams builds up 'a picture of the subjective world opened up by each drug' without ever making the subject dull. He also provides solid answers to some interesting questions. How did drugs,'now all-pervasive multi-billion-dollar black-market phenomenon', first arrive in the modern world? Why are they so firmly associated with the 1960s counter-culture when, in 1900,'any respectable person could walk into a chemist in Britain, Europe or America and choose from a range of cannabis tinctures or hashish pastes, either pure or premixed with cocaine or opium extracts'?
Beginning with Sir Humphry Davy's decision to inhale nitrous oxide so he could study its effects on his mind, each of Jay's chapters deals with a different drug, telling its story from the point at which it was first received into British culture to its ultimate prohibition. His conclusions are balanced, working hard to show how political forces changed alongside ideas about public health and the growing global economy. Anyone seeking to pass an opinion on drugs should own a copy."