bookmate game
Books
Andy Roberts

Albion Dreaming. A popular history of LSD in Britain (Revised Edition with a new foreword by Dr. Sue Blackmore)

Contrary to popular belief, LSD is much more connected to Britain than it is to the USA. This engaging book looks at the use of LSD in British society, from its arrival in 1952 to the present day. It provides a hidden history of a controversial drug and how it permeated British culture. The author explores LSD’s use by the medical profession in treating a variety of psychological and mental problems. At the same time, The Ministry of Defence believed they were on the brink of harnessing LSD as a battlefield incapacitation drug which would enable wars to be won without loss of life. But LSD’s popularity rose with its use among the British counterculture, from the 1950s beatniks through to the late 80s acid house parties. At its height, when it was legal, LSD affected the lives and philosophies of significant individuals (politicians, scientists, writers, educators, entertainers, artists, journalists) as well as ordinary people for good and bad. This book is the first to explore LSD’s amazing influence on British culture and society.
469 printed pages
Have you already read it? How did you like it?
👍👎

Quotes

  • Kntnvchhas quoted2 years ago
    I have many times tried to describe how simply taking a drug can change your whole perception of life, but it is rather like trying to explain colour to the blind. There are no terms of reference in ordinary life to help you to understand. And actually, I am torn between evangelising for the drug and warning everyone not to go within a million miles of it. I suppose the most simple and incredible fact about LSD is also the one that is hardest to believe: that what it reveals to you is not, as is popularly supposed, a hallucination, but an awe-inspiring glimpse of reality. Other drugs distort, but LSD gives you a reality far beyond words, or visual representation, or language. It is quite the reverse of seeing something that isn’t there. LSD disables some chemical filter in the brain that, in order to keep the world manageable, limits the amount of reality you can experience with your senses. An LSD trip allows ‘reality’ – and if you have never questioned what that is, you would after taking LSD – to flood in untrammelled. The result may be terrifying and it may be wonderful, but it will be more ‘real’ than anything
  • Kntnvchhas quoted2 years ago
    μg
    Scientific symbol for microgram (one-millionth of a gram)

On the bookshelves

fb2epub
Drag & drop your files (not more than 5 at once)