Well-illustrated history of smoking, from archaic African tribal rituals to New York’s Easter Emancipated Smokers March in 1929.
A voluminous and well-illustrated volume, published in the Culture of Everyday series, presents the history of smoking, from archaic rituals of African and Indian tribes to opium dens in Victorian London and the Easter Emancipated Smokers’ March in New York in 1929. From the moment that the sailors from the crew of Columbus brought dried tobacco leaves to Europe, it was the smoke that began to occupy the imagination of enlightened Europeans: this smoke was real and nurtured illusions, it gave oblivion and promised a new experience. And if in an archaic culture it was part of a healing rite, in Europe tobacco became a passion and pleasure, and over time, a part of high culture. Several chapters are devoted to smoking in art — in cinema, literature and even … opera. And in advertising. Smoking improves the quality of life, it is the “Cinderella dream” for the working class,” such an idea is gradually being introduced into the mass consciousness. The first brand of machine-made cigarettes, released in 1888, is called Cinderella. Showing how much effort and time has been spent by mankind on the formation of a «smoking culture», the authors, American culturologists and historians, do not seem to believe in the imminent success of the anti-tobacco campaign that has now unfolded.
New Literary Review, 544 p.