ISBN 586-02884-6 (UK pbk, 1970)

Editor's Foreword: The Marijuana Myths by David Solomon

Introduction by Alfred R.Lindesmith, Ph.D.
(selection from The Addict and the Law , Indiana University Press, 1965)

BOOK ONE: HISTORICAL, SOCIOLOGICAL, AND CULTURAL PAPERS

1. "The Pleasant Assassin: The Story of Marijuana" Norman Taylor, Ph.D.
(selection from Narcotics, Nature's Dangerous Gift to Man, Dell, 1963)

2. "The Marijuana Problem: Myth or Reality?" Alfred R.Lindesmith, Ph.D.
(selection from The Addict and the Law , Indiana University Press, 1965)

3. "Cannabis Law Reform in Britain" Stephen Abrams
(original to this anthology, UK edition, 1969)

4. "History of the Development of International Control"
(from Appendix 2 of Cannabis: Report by the Advisory Committee on Drug Dependence , H.M.Stationary Office)

5. "Marijuana: A Sociological Overview" Howard S.Becker, Ph.D.

Becoming a Marijuana User
Marijuana Use and Social Control
The Marijuana Tax Act

(selections from Outsiders , Free Press of Glencoe / Macmillan, 1963)

6. "Bhang and Alcohol: Cultural Factors in the Choice of Intoxicants" George Morris Carstairs, D.P.M., F.R.C.P.
(originally published in Quarterly Journal of Studies on Alcohol , Volume 15, pages 220-237, 1954)

7. "The Politics, Ethics, and Meaning of Marijuana" Timothy Leary, Ph.D.
(original to this anthology, 1966)

8. "Historical Notes" W.Reininger
(reprinted from Ciba Symposia , Volume 8, Number 5-6, August/September 1946)

BOOK TWO: LITERARY AND IMAGINATIVE PAPERS
1. "The Herb Pantagruelion" François Rabelais
(this selection from Pantagruel , Chapters 49-52, Book III; translated by Samuel Putnam)

2. "The Hashish Club" Théophile Gautier
(translated by Ralph J.Gladtone)

3. "An Excerpt from The Seraphic Theatre" Charles Baudelaire
(this selection from The Essence of Laughter and Other Essays edited by Peter Quennell and translated by Norman Cannon)

4. "The Story of Lachen and Idir" Paul Bowles
(from 100 Camels in the Courtyard , City Lights Press, 1962)

5. "Red-Dirt Marijuana" Terry Southern
(originally published in Evergreen Review , 1960)

6. "First Manifesto to End the Bringdown" Allen Ginsberg
(original to this anthology, 1966)

BOOK THREE: SCIENTIFIC PAPERS
1. "The Marijuana Problem in the City of New York" Mayor LaGuardia's Committee on Marijuana

Foreword
Introduction
The Sociological Study
The Clinical Study
Pharmacological Study
Summary

(originally published by Jaques Cattell)

2. "Cannabis: A Controlled Experiment" Andrew Weil, M.D., and Norman E.Zinberg, M.D.
(originally appeared under the title "Cannabis: the First Controlled Experiment" in New Society )

3. "A New Euphoriant for Depressive Mental States" George Tayleur Stockings, M.B., B.S., D.P.M.
(from British Medical Journal , 28 June 1947)

4. "Pyrahexyl in the Treatment of Alcoholic and Drug Withdrawal Conditions" Lloyd J.Thompson, M.D., and Richard Proctor, M.D.
(from North Carolina Medical Journal , October 1953)

5. "Points of Distinction Between Sedative and Consciousness-Expanding Drugs" William S.Burroughs
(reprinted from "Deposition: Testimony Concerning a Sickness", Evergreen Review , January/February 1960)

6. "Therapeutic Application of Marijuana" Dr. Robert Walton
(from Marihuana , J.B.Lippincott, 1938)

7. "Cannabis: A Reference" Dr. William H.McGlothlin

Index

"In recent years, the use of marijuana by growing numbers of people in all walks of life has become one of the most burningly controversial issues with which our society has come face to face. Yet, in spite of the continual furore in the Press, on TV and on the radio, most people probably know little if anything of the marijuana facts -- its effects, history and pharmacology -- as distinct from the marijuana myths.

"What exactly is its relationship to sex? To violence? To crime? To addiction? Is it really harmful? Or perhaps beneficial? What and where are its sources? To these and many more questions, the doctors, scientists, sociologists and writers in this volume (the first paperback of such scope to appear in Britain) provide illuminating answers backed with a wealth of evidence.

"Quite simply, this book is indispensable to anyone who wishes to inform himself on marijuana. David Soloman has collected much more than we expect to find in one volume. Here is the 'LaGuardia Report', the scholarship of W.H.McGlothin, a pioneering sociological effort by Professor Howard S.Becker, and much else, from Rabelais to a magnificent prose high by Allen Ginsberg...Within the covers of one paperback are to be found, I think, all the significant references to the subject, up to 1969." --R.D.Laing [jacket blurb, UK pbk, 1970].

"This extraordinary competent source book on the use, history and pharmacology of Indian hemp reads like a principal volume in a Secret History of Civilization." --Alan Watts Ph.D. (President of the Society for Comparative Philosophy).

Highly recommended.