Rating: 
Summary: Human & Ecological Diversity Fall Victim to the Modern World
Review: "One River" will take you on a journey that you will never forget. It will introduce you to one of the twentieth century's most remarkable men--Richard Evans Schultes, as well as one of the world's most fascinating places--the Amazon.The book is the story of the work of Schultes and two of his students, including the author Wade Davis. It will take you as close as you can ever be to lost cultures and lost ecosystems along with cultures and ecosystems that are very much endangered. Wade Davis is a champion of both human and ecological diversity. "One River" is probably the most eloquent testament to ethnic and biological diversity I've ever read. As the modern world encroaches on every last nook and cranny of this beautiful earth, "One River" serves as a primer about what once was and about the price we pay as we lose one more species, or one more human culture forever. This book is an adventure story. It is a story of incredible academic accomplishment. The term academic, with its connotations of being hopelessly removed from the real world does not apply here. Schultes and his students could not be more connected to the real world. "One River" is the story of man and nature and how the two interact, each forever changing the other. Read this book and then tell your friends about it. While it is hard to make such a claim (there are so many good books), I'd have to say this is my favorite book.
Rating:
Summary: Human & Ecological Diversity Fall Victim to the Modern World
Review: "One River" will take you on a journey that you will never forget. It will introduce you to one of the twentieth century's most remarkable men--Richard Evans Schultes, as well as one of the world's most fascinating places--the Amazon. The book is the story of the work of Schultes and two of his students, including the author Wade Davis. It will take you as close as you can ever be to lost cultures and lost ecosystems along with cultures and ecosystems that are very much endangered. Wade Davis is a champion of both human and ecological diversity. "One River" is probably the most eloquent testament to ethnic and biological diversity I've ever read. As the modern world encroaches on every last nook and cranny of this beautiful earth, "One River" serves as a primer about what once was and about the price we pay as we lose one more species, or one more human culture forever. This book is an adventure story. It is a story of incredible academic accomplishment. The term academic, with its connotations of being hopelessly removed from the real world does not apply here. Schultes and his students could not be more connected to the real world. "One River" is the story of man and nature and how the two interact, each forever changing the other. Read this book and then tell your friends about it. While it is hard to make such a claim (there are so many good books), I'd have to say this is my favorite book.
Rating:
Summary: Eye-opening,enlightening trip across time and cultures-a 10!
Review: "One River..." is an exciting must-read that puts the in-discriminate anti-drug hysteria of our present-day culture
in perspective.
Who are we to say that all drugs are bad? Which drugs will be found to be miracles, and which will be found to be nightmares?
Which drugs have withstood the test of time, and for what uses?
Now that the "war on drugs" is a unmitigated failure, it's
time to take a hard look as to which drugs are "good" and
which are "bad" and for what purposes and in what quanities.
The book is required reading for anyone to intelligently
examine the role drugs play in an enlightened society-- a legal trip without any of the costs and tribulations
associated with international travel in South America, or any of those nasty side effects of pushing the envelope
of drug experimentation in our society, such as nausea and worse--jail!
Don't tell your mothers-- or anyone else-- about this one if
they think that an intelligent examination of drugs means
"just [blindly] saying no"--they just won't get it. (Is there
still anyone out there that still thinks this "war on drugs"
isn't a dismal failure?)
In our society today, this book is like doing the crime without doing the time. Some drugs might actually be "good
drugs." (!) What a concept! Whether our current "head in the sand" attitudes stand the test of time (as some of the the thousand-year-old
customs and rituals contained in this book have) remains
to be seen. How will history judge our simplistic drug policies?
Why shouldn't a people be free to experience religious and earthly pleasures? Who are we to deny other (much older) cultures their beliefs? We're the ones killing babies while
making meth in bathtubs. This book is an adventure classic!
Rating:
Summary: Depswa disclosed
Review: Anyone still doubting the superiority of truth over fiction need only take this book to a quiet corner and start reading. Wade Davis relates the stories of two Richards, Schultes and Spruce, plus his own in their respective excursions in the upper Amazon. Schultes, Davis' Harvard mentor, spent many years there seeking medicinal plants and new sources of rubber when access to Asian resins were lost during World War II. No work of fiction, including Hollywood's almost trifling account in the film Medicine Man, can match the scope of what Schultes accomplished during his extensive travels. Schultes had the good sense to approach the Native American shamans with respect, dealing with them on their terms and not as a latter-day conquistador. They responded to his inquiries in kind, leading to countless new medicines for treating our "civilized" illnesses. He became a "depswa" - medicine man - sharing their rituals while gaining knowledge. Davis is able to use his close relationship with Schultes to provide an engrossing and detailed account of Schultes' career in the bush. The second Richard is Schultes' own model. Richard Spruce came to the Upper Amazon from mid-Victorian England. Prompted by an inestimable source, Charles Darwin's account of the Beagle voyage, Spruce entered the Amazon country in 1849. Few of the celebrated explorers in Africa in the same period can match the perils Spruce faced and dealt with. As did his follower Schultes, Spruce avoided the overbearing colonialist image - his desires were achieved by finding new medicinal plants. Spruce dealt with the dispensers of drugs and their tales of visions incurred as an equal. In their turn they imparted valuable information leading to useful medicines. Clearly, both Schultes and Spruce operated as Davis stipulates: "botanists in the Amazon must come to peace with their own ignorance." As Schultes, Spruce and Davis himself demonstrate, the peaceful approach brings substantial rewards in information and experience. Davis' own, modern, story enhances that of his mentor Schultes, carrying the research and adventure forward. Only the ability to travel further and faster than his teacher separates the two. Davis has a sensitive touch in describing the world of the Upper Amazon, its dense forests and often mysterious people. His grief at the loss of their culture is manifest, buttressed by a strong historical sense of what they once were. Certainly this account belies the image of the "detached" scientist scouring the forest's resources for personal gain. He is there to learn and to teach us. He accomplishes both with a fascinating narrative. This is a book to be treasured and read again. A single sitting with this book is but an introduction to this disappearing world. Read it and discover that adventure is not a lost experience.
Rating:
Summary: Depswa disclosed
Review: Anyone still doubting the superiority of truth over fiction need only take this book to a quiet corner and start reading. Wade Davis relates the stories of two Richards, Schultes and Spruce, plus his own in their respective excursions in the upper Amazon. Schultes, Davis' Harvard mentor, spent many years there seeking medicinal plants and new sources of rubber when access to Asian resins were lost during World War II. No work of fiction, including Hollywood's almost trifling account in the film Medicine Man, can match the scope of what Schultes accomplished during his extensive travels. Schultes had the good sense to approach the Native American shamans with respect, dealing with them on their terms and not as a latter-day conquistador. They responded to his inquiries in kind, leading to countless new medicines for treating our "civilized" illnesses. He became a "depswa" - medicine man - sharing their rituals while gaining knowledge. Davis is able to use his close relationship with Schultes to provide an engrossing and detailed account of Schultes' career in the bush. The second Richard is Schultes' own model. Richard Spruce came to the Upper Amazon from mid-Victorian England. Prompted by an inestimable source, Charles Darwin's account of the Beagle voyage, Spruce entered the Amazon country in 1849. Few of the celebrated explorers in Africa in the same period can match the perils Spruce faced and dealt with. As did his follower Schultes, Spruce avoided the overbearing colonialist image - his desires were achieved by finding new medicinal plants. Spruce dealt with the dispensers of drugs and their tales of visions incurred as an equal. In their turn they imparted valuable information leading to useful medicines. Clearly, both Schultes and Spruce operated as Davis stipulates: "botanists in the Amazon must come to peace with their own ignorance." As Schultes, Spruce and Davis himself demonstrate, the peaceful approach brings substantial rewards in information and experience. Davis' own, modern, story enhances that of his mentor Schultes, carrying the research and adventure forward. Only the ability to travel further and faster than his teacher separates the two. Davis has a sensitive touch in describing the world of the Upper Amazon, its dense forests and often mysterious people. His grief at the loss of their culture is manifest, buttressed by a strong historical sense of what they once were. Certainly this account belies the image of the "detached" scientist scouring the forest's resources for personal gain. He is there to learn and to teach us. He accomplishes both with a fascinating narrative. This is a book to be treasured and read again. A single sitting with this book is but an introduction to this disappearing world. Read it and discover that adventure is not a lost experience.
Rating: 
Summary: ADVENTUROUS PSYCHONAUTS BEWARE
Review: Being interested in pharmacological psychedelics and their effects, I was most disappointed by this mundane travelogue. I struggled immeasurably to get through this tome. I kept aiming it at the trash can, but kept telling myself it was going to get better. It didn't and it ultimately ended up there. I expected an adventure novel into alternate dimensions or Davis' personal journey into mind altering hyper-dimensions. It was not to be. I understand the importance of Schultes work. All psychonauts owe this man a debt of gratitude. But this book is a tedious retracing of every footstep this man made in his discoveries, along with Wade Davis' personal journey and dealings with Schultes. Very dry reading in my opinion. SERPENT AND THE RAINBOW is a better book. Readers should be warned this is NOT a psychedelic adventure story, but a tiresome travelogue of plant classification. Important, I suppose, if that's what you're looking for. I prefer Schultes' own book PLANTS OF THE GODS. It's wonderfully illustrated and an easier read. Or if you're looking for a true psychonaut's adventures in South America, I'd suggest reading anything by Terence McKenna. He was one strange and brilliant fellow. Or THE COSMIC SERPENT by Jeremy Narby. Frankly, I'm surprised by the glowing reviews for this book. I found it to be quite boring.
Speaking of Wade Davis, there was a rumor some years ago that he was living amongst the Rastafarians in the Blue Mountains of Jamaica and planned to write a book about it. Now, that would be fascinating.
Rating:
Summary: one river; explorations and discoveries in the amazon
Review: Born and raised in Ontario, Wade Davis is currently explorer on staff for National Geographic.
His book delivers in its adventure, mystery and beauty. It informs to boot and what’s more this is non-fiction! One River chronicles not only Davis’ travels in the Amazon but also that of his mentor, the celebrated Harvard Botanist, Richard Schultes who, earlier, spent more than two decades exploring the same Region during the thirties through the forties. Davis keeps alternating between his own accounts and those of Schultes. Despite the mention of dates in each successive chapter, Davis’ tale begins to meld the different eras together in which all these events occurred, creating a sense of timelessness for the reader. Filled with fascinating characters, amazing discoveries and encounters with tribal cultures that can only be described as mind-altering, this book succeeds in overwhelming the reader with the richness of the Amazon in all of its bio-diversity, its history and its people. Personally, I came away shaken to the core. I guess it happens when the world suddenly gets much bigger than you had previously perceived. Warning. One River contains occasional profanity and descriptions of hallucinogenic drug taking.
I found that his repeated and detailed descriptions of drug “trips” were tedious and irrelevant to the story. However, this book can still seriously challenge the assumptions that you hold about the world around you!
Rating:
Summary: Must reading for anyone with an interest in adventure.
Review: For a scientific text, this book reads like Raiders of the Lost Ark! On a trip to Amazonia this summer, an American resident of the Amazon with a museum of Amazonia art told me this book is his "bible." For a text with so much scientific detail, it is still hard to put down. It added a great deal of insight to my trip from Iquitos to Belem.
Rating:
Summary: sweet herb
Review: Have you ever heard or seen the Amazon? Well, if not, listen to what Wade Davis has to say. Picture this: you are traveling down one of Ecuador's tributaries, you happen to arrive upon a mean case of malaria, you companion dies, yet, the species, the science is paramount. This novel--if it can be considered a novel, since the format almost matches biography--is unsurpassed in quality and reader appeal. I am stictly a fiction reader, but when I received One River, I not only fell in love with science, I fell in love with Wade Davis' writing style. Read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Amazing
Review: I had the pleasure of taking a rafting trip down the Taku river in British Columbia with Wade Davis, his family, National Geographic, and The River Leage in July 2001. He told some of the stories in this book around the campfire and it was great to learn he feels just as passionately about them in real life as it came across in his books.
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