Rating: 
Summary: Excellent book
Review: This is an amazing book.
Author Pollan takes us on a journey through history, botany, and the human psyche through examination of four plants - the apple, tulip, marijuana, and potato.
Recurring themes through the book are how plants benefit from encouraging human attention, and the dangers of monoculture, especially how modern man has taken the diversity available in nature and severely limited that diversity, limiting the plants' ability to respond to environmental challenges.
Throughout the book he sprinkles tidbits of information on the plant described, and on the surrounding human culture. He reveals, for instance, that the apple was not only one of the only sources of sweetness in early America, but that the main use of apples in early America was cider. Because we have so limited the original diversity of the apple into just a few strains, apples require large amounts of artificially-applied pesticide to fight the continually-adapting apple pests.
He explains not only how the tulip mania in Holland rose and fell, but why the prized feathered or "broken" tulips were less hardy.
In the discussion on marijuana, Pollan diverges into interesting discussions of the chemistry of human consciousness, how psychoactive plants interact with our consciousness, society's reaction to the use of marijuana, and how strengthened prohibitions against marijuana have ironically led to more potent marijuana.
Talking about the potato, Pollard discusses the dangers of genetically engineered plants - bringing in a pesticide gene from a bacteria to the potato, which results in not only biological dangers, but the danger of putting big business in tight control of agriculture. Pollard also discusses not only how the Irish potato blight came to be, but why it particularly impacted the Irish.
Woven through all these discussions is the theme of the split human attitude toward nature - admiring its wildness, while attempting to exert maximum control over it.You'll enjoy this book - as you will a similar book (though less esoteric) - _An Empire of Plants: People and Plants that Changed the World_ by Toby and Will Musgrave, which explores the worlds of tobacco, sugar cane, cotton, tea, poppies, quinine and rubber.
Rating:
Summary: AN APPLE IS NOT JUST AN APPLE!
Review: Michael Pollan has an incredible gift to tell a story and captivate his readers. After reading this book you will never again be able to look out the window at your garden without feeling some assimilation to Nature's harvest, particularly if apples and potatoes are among the fare, and the tulips are prolific. If marijuana also happens to be hidden among the pretty green foliage, well....naughty you! However, these are the four plants the author uses to portray the significant relationship between man and the plant world. The sweetness of the apple, the use of the potato in an attempt to control nature, the exhilarating beauty of the tulip, and the intoxicating abilities of marijuana are all discussed in a spirited and fascinating manner. In reaction to anti-drug control, marijuana became a hothouse plant, and moving it to a controlled environment sometimes brought on a lot more "heat" than initially found in the hothouse! I enjoyed the author's exhilarating writing style and refreshing outlook on man and nature; the book is a pleasure to read.
Rating: 
Summary: Painful.
Review: I got a library copy, so I'm really glad. Pollan has the amazing ability to go from Point A to B through the most circuitous route imaginable. I did borrow it because a friend recommended it, and, I do like reading books in the popular science category. But this one would have done much better, in my opinion, with a lot of editing. Those who've read it and not liked it will agree that Pollan keeps repeating himself, and he keeps sidetracking on sidetracks. Apollo, Dionysus, Apollo again, Dionysus again. WE GET THE POINT. It certainly doesn't help if you keep repeating yourself. This is what happens when authors try to write poetically without paying heed to subtlety; metaphors get stretched, the writing becomes ponderous and unbearable. Pollan could write an abridged version, without TOO MUCH of the flowery language, and I think I might actually like it.
Rating:
Summary: Plants and Humans Influence Each Other for Mutual Benefit!
Review: "What existential difference is there between the human being's role in this (or any) garden and the bumblebees?" "Did I choose to plant these potatoes, or did the potato make me do it? With profound questions like these, Michael Pollan pollinates your mind with a new world view of our relationships with plants, one in which humans are not at the center. The book focuses on four primary examples of how plants provide benefits to humans that lead humans to benefit the plants (apples for sweetness, tulips for beauty, marijuana for intoxication, and the potato for control over nature's food supply). You will learn many new facts in the process that will fascinate you. The book's main value is that you will learn that we need to be more thoughtful in how we assist in the evolution of plant species. The book builds on Darwin's original observations about how artificial evolution occurs (evolution directed by human efforts). So-called domesticated species thrive while the wild ones we admire often do not. Compare dogs to wolves as an example. Mr. Pollan challenges the mental separation we make between wild and domesticated species successfully in the book. The apple section was my favorite. You will learn that John Chapman (Johnny Appleseed) was a rather odd fellow who was actually in the business of raising and selling apple trees. He planted a few seeds at the homes where he stayed overnight on his travels. Mr. Chapman had apple tree nurseries all over Ohio and Indiana, which he started 2-3 years before he expected an influx of settlers. Homesteading laws required these settlers to plant 50 apple or pears trees in order to take title to the land. And these apples were for making hard apple cider, not eating apples. He was the "American Dionysus" in Mr. Pollan's view. Apple trees need to be grafted to make good eating apples. Chapman's trees produced many genetic variations, which are good for the species. Apple trees became more narrow in their genes after other sources for alcohol and sweetness became available (from cane sugar). Now, the ancient genes of apple trees are being kept in living form from Kazakhstan, before they are lost due to economic development. Tulips were the source of the famous Tulipmania in Holland. Rare colors occurred due to viruses. Those became extremely valuable during the tulip boom market in the 17th century. Now, growers try to keep the viruses out and we have much more dull, consistent species. We have probably lost much beauty in favor of order in the process. The intoxicants in marijuana are probably caused by toxins that the plants make to kill off insects. Because the plant is a weed, it grows very rapidly. There is a hilarious story about the author's experiences in growing two plants that you will love. As the antidrug war progressed, marijuana became a hothouse plant and was bred and developed to grow much more rapidly under humid, high-light conditions indoors. You will read about modern commercial farms in Holland. The potato story is the most complex. The Irish potato famine related to monoculture. The Incas had always planted a variety of potatoes to avoid the risk of disease. Now, biotechnology has added an insecticide to the leaves of potato plants, taking monoculture one step further. Interestingly, the insects are already becoming resistant to the insecticide. Are we building a new risk to famine with this approach? How will genetically altered potatoes affect humans? Is having consistent french fries at fast food places enough of an incentive to take this risk? These are the kinds of questions raised by this chapter. Mr. Pollan has described a "dance of human and plant desire that left neither the plants nor the people . . . unchanged." His key point is that we should be sure to include strong biodiversity in our approaches. Nature can create more variation faster than fledgling biotechnology industry can. Time has proven that biodiversity has many advantages for humans while monoculture has usually proven to have at least one major drawback. In reality, we can probably have both. If you are like me, you will find Mr. Pollan's personal experiences with the plants and his investigations of the historical figures to be fascinating. He is a good story teller, and a fine writer. After you read this book, take a walk through a park or a garden and think about Mr. Pollan's argument. Then consider how these principles can be applied to help ideas change, improve, and grow in more valuable ways. Look at life from many different perspectives . . . and live more intelligently and beneficially!
Rating: 
Summary: A good, but questionable, effort
Review: Pollan's The Botany of Desire is certainly a fascinating book, and I would say that it is also a valuable read, but not for its scientific accuracy or integrity. Firstly, the author is not a scientist but a journalist, and we all know that journalists tend to glorify and exaggerate. His argument itself is attractive in some ways but consistently equivocal and vague. Though skeptical throughout, I did enjoy this book for the author's fluid writing, good sense of humor, and solid attempts and evolutionary insight.
Pollan claims that that the plants we domesticate have evolved to please our senses and thus encourage us to grow them in vast amounts, in effect, helping them to propagate. At first, this is a very attractive idea, but with further thought it does not hold up. Are people and the plants they grow commercially really in an obligate mutualistic relationship? Well, yes, they are. Human society, particularly in industrially developed countries, has become dependent on domesticated crops. But I would argue that we have moulded these crops to our own ends; the influence of natural selection upon these crops' ancestors is not as significant as the artificial selection we exerted upon them. Yes, apple trees did first have to get our attention before we would start growing them voluntarily, but we have artificially selected the apples that you and I eat today. Those huge Granny Smiths and Red and Golden Delicious you see at the grocery are not wild type species in the least bit. They are as much a designed piece of technology as is a finely tuned engine, and the orchard in which they grow is not really different from a factory. These domesticated species would never have flourished in a primitive environment, and they are totally defenseless to pests and other threats without the aid of their inventors, us. What difference does this make? We are still producing large numbers of them; isn't that all that counts? Well, you could always say that we are propagating the apples, potatoes, cannabis, whatever, but we produce them on our terms, not theirs. We artificially select the characters we want, and then we clone them by vegetative methods. The plants were not and are not evolving to please us; they are being manipulated to please us. Think about all the seedless fruits we have developed and sustained (grapes, bananas, watermelon, pinneapple, just to name a few). This process is the equivalent of evolutionary castration, reducing these plants to nothing more than a toolbox of malleable biotic mechanisms. They are no longer independently evolving; we sustain them solely for our own benefit, and the genetic lines of the plants themselves are frozen in time. Now that I have griped, I must say that this book is not without its benefits. I had not really thought about plants the way Pollan presents here, and I must thank him for opening my eyes in this respect. Although I don't agree with him, I derived great value in following his thought process about domesticated plants. For this reason, I would recommend this book to those who would like to debate an interesting evolutionary topic that is a nice twist on traditional perspective.
Rating:
Summary: fascinating page turner
Review: Wildly Enthusiastic Recommend: Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan
This book is really different from your average reading fare. It's a delightful mix of facts both scientific and historical, fantastical meanderings, and just plain fun. The catching premise is that plants have co-opted man into promoting their prosperity. Pollan uses four plants to illustrate this premise: apples, tulips, marijuana, and potatoes. Each chapter is a wonderfully readable story about the plant and its history intertwined with its relationship to man. The apple chapter has amazing information about Johnny Appleseed, and because as a child I wanted to be Johnny Appleseed, I found this fascinating. It reinforced my belief that I had good instincts as a kid. Then the tulip chapter gives you the details of tulip-mania in the Netherlands in the 1600s (think Internet bubble), making it seem amazing that this sort of thing keeps happening. The marijuana chapter is the funniest and most sinister in that it makes you want to get some good stuff, now. The potato chapter is the scariest - genetically modified foods.
Rating: 
Summary: A treat to read
Review: The central idea of this book - the idea that plants obtain a Darwinian benefit from appealing to the desires of humans - underlies four essays each on a single plant (apples, tulips, marijuana, and potatoes). Frequently this thesis was buried underneath another of Pollan's interesting ideas (for example the futility of man's manipulation of the natural environment, or what makes the apple peculiarly "American"). But to be honest I did not mind. Pollan is a completely entertaining writer. He is equal parts funny, insightful, poetic, and informative. For example, I loved his extended metaphor of the variability of nature as a library. Each apple tree looks about the same, but inside they are quite different. The value of the library lies in these differences. The reasons I gave this book a "4" rather than a "5" may be minor from your perspective, depending on your own reading habits: The Tulip essay was well done but not news if you have read other books or articles on Holland's tulip mania. The Marijuana essay seemed to me a bit, um, disjointed and paranoid (hmmmm...wonder why?) although still entertaining. You may have already read the Apple essay in Harpers and/or the potato essay in the NYT Sunday Magazine. If you have not, however, they are both must reads (you will never eat a non-organic potato again when Pollan gets done with you). Pollan's book itself illustrates the generative power of variability - he floats from idea to idea like a bee, and something new is created as a result.
Rating:
Summary: A Pleasurable, Interesting Read
Review: I doubt I would have picked up a book called "The Botany of Desire" if not for some very strange circumstances. I needed something to read while waiting in the emergency room, and my best friend gave this book to my wife for her birthday. She's the gardener, and my taste in literature usually runs towards the fictive, but I found myself enjoying "TBOD" in spite of myself. Michael Pollan operates off of an unusual, but simple proposition: that plants have evolved to use human beings as much as we have evolved to use plants. He uses four examples to illustrate his point: the apple (sweetness), the tulip (beauty), marijuana (intoxication), and the potato (control), each plant representing a basic human desire. The way those plants use our desires is evolutionarily a good thing for the plant, allowing them to propagate like mad and become hardier and far more resilient to weather and disease. As some of the other reviewers have noted, "TBOD" is pretty light on the actual science, but the target audience here isn't scientists or those who require heavy amounts of scientific proofs to enjoy a book. It's a prose book, written for people who have little working knowledge of plants or the garden, and I found the historical anecdotes Pollan provided much more entertaining than his actual thesis (which is kind of one of those "well, duh!" things anyway). His deconstruction of the Johnny Appleseed myth (I was born in Central Ohio, and grew up with it, so it was interesting to read the facts) was priceless, as was his treatment of the historical role of flowers and drugs like marijuana. "TBOD" is well-written, and Pollan has a mastery of prose rare in writers these days. His words not only flow off the tongue (or page, if you will), he knows how to craft a sentence and a paragraph to create and enhance the mood of the passage - it's a deft scribbling hand, indeed. If you want a guide on gardening and plant breeding, look elsewhere. If you want a good read about plants historically and evolutionarily speaking, check out "TBOD." Final Grade: B+
Rating:
Summary: More poetry than science
Review: Although this book is marketed as popular science, its science has to take a back seat to its romantic, poetic mind set. No book of science would say that apples from seedling trees "don't come true" without stating the genetic reasons for this phenomenon (a seedling is a hybrid with two parents). The author concedes that "evolution doesn't depend on will or intention to work; it is , almost by definition an unconscious, unwilled process"... that seems "clever only in retrospect."But on numerous occasions throughout the book he uses language like " The plants hit on a remarkably clever strategy," "plants are willing partners,""the apple transformed itself, " "the plants develped poisons in their seeds to ensure that only the sweet flesh is consumed," etc. Such phrases imply design, will, and intention which anthropomorphize plants and don't precisely convey the process by which the result was achieved. The author further relies on myth (Apollonian versus Dionysian attributes), metaphor, Platonic ideal (such as "The Apple") to make his points. All of this is harmless enough, I suppose, if readers are critical enough to recognize that this is not science. Poetry itself has value and so does popular science in attracting an audience that would be intimidated by something more precise and factual. The book does stimulate thought, but works better if readers can confer with a scientist while reading it.
Rating:
Summary: A book for those who love plants
Review: Ever wonder what part of the Jonny Appleseed myth was fact or fiction? Or how genetically modified potatoes have changed agriculture in Idaho? This is a very interesting book to anyone who is fascinated with plants (and their people.) Pollan blends amusing personal anecdotes, historical synthesis, and intreging science surrounding popular plants. He falls into conjecture and academic jargon at times, but overall it's an enjoyable read.
|
