The nineteenth-century opium complex: From Thomas Love Peacock to Sherlock Holmes
Year: 2020
Type: article
Abstract: This introduction to the special issue proposes that two discrete nineteenth-century histories of opium – a literary history, initiated by the drug confessions of De Quincey, and a colonial history, exemplified by the commercial activities of the East India Company (in which Thomas Love Peacock participated) in cultivating opium in Bengal for export to China, leading to the first Opium War – are common elements in a nineteenth-century ‘opium complex’, a set of interlocking practices of individuals and (quasi)state actors, extending across the globe. Sherlock Holmes detective stories are read as compressed registers of tensions that inhere in this complex.
Source: Literature & History
Authors: Josephine McDonagh, Briony Wickes
Institutions: University of Chicago, University of Glasgow
Language: English
Subfield: Literature and Literary Theory
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid: $3,000
OpenAlex ID: W3024790040