Confessions of an English Opium Eater: And Other Writings (Penguin Classics)

"Thou has the keys of Paradise, oh just, subtle, and mighty opium!" Determined to counter the lies about opium that had been told by travellers to the Orient and the medical profession, De Quincey describes his addiction, the consciousness alteringproperties of the drug, its pleasures and its pains. Offers an account of the pleasures and pains of worshipping at the 'Church of Opium'. This autobiography of addiction hauntingly describes the author's surreal visions and hallucinatory nocturnal wanderings through London, along with the nightmares, despair and paranoia to which he became prey.