More than fifty years before it was isolated as a drug, Samuel Taylor Coleridge dreamed up cocaine. In the early years of the nineteenth century, the poet was increasingly dependent on opium, a “free-agency-annihilating Poison,” as he called it, which sapped his will and made him despondent. “A Gymnastic Medicine is wanting,” he wrote in his notebook during the winter of 1808-09, “a system of forcing the Will & motive faculties into action.” The medicine he envisaged would be a kind of anti-opium, a tonic to kickstart the nerves, restore the mind’s athletic powers, and repair the broken link between volition and accomplishment. It would be a second, health-giving “poison” to work on the first.
この記事は The New Yorker の April 24 - May 01, 2023 (Double Issue) 版に掲載されています。
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この記事は The New Yorker の April 24 - May 01, 2023 (Double Issue) 版に掲載されています。
7 日間の Magzter GOLD 無料トライアルを開始して、何千もの厳選されたプレミアム ストーリー、9,000 以上の雑誌や新聞にアクセスしてください。
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BADDIE ISSUES
\"Wicked\" and \"Gladiator II.\"
LET'S MAKE A DEAL
\"Death Becomes Her\" and \"Burnout Paradise.\"
ANTI HEROES
\"The Franchise,\" on HBO.
FELLOW-TRAVELLERS
The surprisingly sunny origins of the Frankfurt School.
NOW YOU SEE ME
John Singer Sargent's strange, slippery portraits of an art dealer's family.
PARIS FRIEND - SHUANG XUETAO
Xiaoguo had a terror of thirst, so he kept a glass of water on the table beside his hospital bed. As soon as it was empty, he asked me to refill it. I wanted to warn him that this was unhealthy - guzzling water all night long puts pressure on the kidneys, and pissing that much couldn't be good for his injury. He was tall, though, so I decided his insides could probably cope.
WILD SIDE
Is Lake Tahoe's bear boom getting out of hand?
GETTING A GRIP
Robots learn to use their hands.
WITHHOLDING SEX FROM MY WIFE
In the wake of [the] election, progressive women, who are outraged over Donald Trump's victory at the ballot box, have taken to social media with public, vengeful vows of chastity. - The Free Press.
DEADLINE EXTENSION
Old age, reborn.