The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s Eye View of the World

Michael Pollan
Random House, New York, NY
2001, 271 pp.
Price: $24.95
ISBN 0375501290 (hardcover)

Titles can be poetry. And such is the case with Michael Pollan’s latest book, The Botany of Desire, which first caught my attention simply by its title. Botany and desire—How could they relate? The thrust of Pollan’s book is the way some plants use us (like human bumble bees) as instruments for their selection. It is an odd premise, but one astutely presented by the author who uses four case studies: apples, tulips, marijuana, and potatoes. Reading this magnificent treatise is a wild ride through the doors of perception.

The first chapter, on apples, presents the convoluted history of this plant from its endemic area in Kazakhstan to the riverside plots planted by John Chapman (a.k.a. Johnny Appleseed). It is interesting to learn the historical truth about Mr. Appleseed: his apple trees were intended for producing apple cider and not for altruistic reasons having to do with the nutritional value of apples. Throughout these travels, we learn about the genetic variability reductio ad absurdum to cater to commercial interests, and the efforts to maintain the world’s largest collection of apple trees in Geneva (New York) to safeguard genetic diversity. And the chapter is indeed sweet, going back to the old meaning of this word, which Pollan explains in detail.

From the sweetness of apples, Pollan’s transports us to the beauty of tulips; or as he rightly calls them, "pigments on a stick," "lipstick in a landscape," or "eye candy." On a recent visit to The Netherlands I had the opportunity to admire a 1620 still-life by Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder, which contained tulips and other flowers, as well as the hidden and ephemeral insect, all symbols of life’s fleeting nature.

After reading Pollan’s book, I now see this painting from a historical perspective based on the tulipomania of the Dutch in the early 17th century, which lasted about 70 years. During this period, enormous amounts of money were spent for bulbs, and fortunes made and lost. This popular delusion was immortalized in many exquisite paintings such as Bosschaert’s. As it turns out, these widely admired tulips were infected with a virus that caused them to "break" into flames of color. This virus has now been cleaned from the genetic pool, even though now and then their effects upon the phenotype can be seen in what are meant to be uniform plantings. But a buried message in our attempts to appreciate the beauty of flowers is the philosophical question as to what purpose it serves for humans to be innately attracted to flowers. Of course, in evolutionary terms, it would point out where food would be present. But in terms of aesthetic beauty, what purpose does it serve? Is it here where plants are using humans? These questions are deftly addressed by Pollan, sometimes using Dionysian and Apollonian analogies, unfortunately, to an extreme.

It is no accident that the tulip chapter is followed by one dealing with a psychosomatic plant, Cannabis. It has been said by those well versed in the area that beauty gains a new meaning when a high understanding of marijuana is attained. Pollan presents philosophical ideas that conjure thoughts that some readers might consider are possible only under the effect of the plant being discussed, intricately weaving a thread that touches on religion, politics, and culture.

From Cannabis, Pollan moves on to potatoes. Transgenic potatoes are now widely planted in the United States. Pollan narrates his attempt to cultivate Monsanto’s "New Leaf" transgenic potato and intersperses historical facts about the tuber, including its introduction to Europe and the sociocultural prejudices of the time that determined when and where the potato would be cultivated.

He draws an interesting comparison between the farmers who grow transgenic potatoes and an organic grower. Even though in the United States it is anathema to be opposed to transgenic plants, I found this chapter to be refreshing because in a subtle and gentle way, it reminds us scientists that one of our main missions is to ask, and to ponder, to find answers through experimentation—something that unfortunately does not enter the transgenic dialogue spectrum. We are supposed to take it for granted that transgenic plants are "good" and any inquiry as to their safety, cross-pollination, resistance, costs, benefits, etc., must be based on crass ignorance, because those who question must not comprehend what is contained within the goblet of fire. I am being sarcastic, of course. The late Frank Zappa once wrote that "the most important thing in art is the frame"; I submit that the most important thing in science is questioning.

The botany of desire depends on what John Nash called the diet of the mind: what pleases it and what challenges its state. Michael Pollan’s book is a superb account of history, philosophy, nature, and human desires, all connected in such a way as to marvel the reader. In the early 18th century, an official of the East India Company wrote, "We taste the spices of Arabia, yet never feel the scorching sun which brings them forth." Pollan’s book is an excellent step in understanding how that scorching sun has brought so many of nature’s wonders from their ancestral lands to their current—and for the most part—corporate state. I highly recommend this excellent book.

Fernando E. Vega
Silver Spring, MD
American Entomologist
Vol. 49, No.2, Summer 2003