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Literary works written while consuming "drugs"
For a while now I have been interested in writers using drugs to transform their consciousness and their literary works. I have been trying to discover European/latin-american writers who were habitual drug users and who used it particularly to enchance their literary works.
Here is a list of writers and books I have discovered so far.
Cocaine by Pitigrili - "Tito, a failed medical student who has just been hired as a journalist, begins to investigate cocaine dens in order to write an article for a Paris newspaper appropriately named The Fleeting Moment. In the course of his research, he indulges in the white powder, which for a time acts as a kind of welcome balm, giving him “a sense, not just of euphoria, but of boundless optimism, and a special kind of receptivity to insults, which were converted in his ears into courteous compliments.”
The novel has several hilariously inventive subplots/scenes - the narrator writing a report of an execution that never took place that makes the prisoner a cult hero in Paris- but they are also mixed with reflections of maniacal intensity. I loved this novel. It is the funniest book I have ever read.
Géza Csáth - A Hungarian short story writer of early 20th century who used enormous amounts of opium to fuel his writings and to channel his inner Poe.
From the wiki - "Most of his emblematic "dark" short stories were written during this period, often featuring utter physical or mental violence (such as fratricide, rape or seduction and abandonment of adolescent girls). Csáth often described these acts in first person, with powerful insight into the workings of the perpetrators' disturbed minds".
One of his short story collections is translated and I hope to read it soon.
Rodolfo Enrique Fogwill - Argentinian writer who is famous for his novel Malvinas Requiem.
From the wiki - "The critic María A. Duran calls Fogwill's Malvinas Requiem "a masterful and disillusioned story of an absurd war." Famously, it was begun before the war had even ended, and finished only a week later, product of a seventy-two-hour writing binge without sleep, fuelled by cocaine. The Argentine critic Martín Kohan compares the book's publication to an earthquake: "you would have to measure it on the Richter scale."
His literary friends described him as a "social cocaine addict", "atomic ball breaker" and evil "dandy".
Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz - Polish writer who wrote 3 absurdist novels, more than 20 absurdist plays and thousands of powerful paintings. He used peyote, cocaine , mescaline to fuel his writings/paintings.
La Onda (The Wave) - A 1960's Mexican artistic movement which emphasised use of drugs to produce great works of music, literature and cinema. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Onda?wprov=sfla1
Brief mentions-
Novel with cocaine by M. Ageyev
The Blind Owl by Sadegh Hedayat(written on opium)
Vladimir Sorkokin's whole ouvre
Victor Pelevin's whole ouvre
I want to discover European novels or Latin American novels rich with experiences of magic mushrooms, LSD, DMT, ayahuasca, etc. Does anyone know?
Edit - No english language works and no obvious ones. Mention writers that are slightly obscure.
For a while now I have been interested in writers using drugs to transform their consciousness and their literary works. I have been trying to discover European/latin-american writers who were habitual drug users and who used it particularly to enchance their literary works.
Here is a list of writers and books I have discovered so far.
Cocaine by Pitigrili - "Tito, a failed medical student who has just been hired as a journalist, begins to investigate cocaine dens in order to write an article for a Paris newspaper appropriately named The Fleeting Moment. In the course of his research, he indulges in the white powder, which for a time acts as a kind of welcome balm, giving him “a sense, not just of euphoria, but of boundless optimism, and a special kind of receptivity to insults, which were converted in his ears into courteous compliments.”
The novel has several hilariously inventive subplots/scenes - the narrator writing a report of an execution that never took place that makes the prisoner a cult hero in Paris- but they are also mixed with reflections of maniacal intensity. I loved this novel. It is the funniest book I have ever read.
Géza Csáth - A Hungarian short story writer of early 20th century who used enormous amounts of opium to fuel his writings and to channel his inner Poe.
From the wiki - "Most of his emblematic "dark" short stories were written during this period, often featuring utter physical or mental violence (such as fratricide, rape or seduction and abandonment of adolescent girls). Csáth often described these acts in first person, with powerful insight into the workings of the perpetrators' disturbed minds".
One of his short story collections is translated and I hope to read it soon.
Rodolfo Enrique Fogwill - Argentinian writer who is famous for his novel Malvinas Requiem.
From the wiki - "The critic María A. Duran calls Fogwill's Malvinas Requiem "a masterful and disillusioned story of an absurd war." Famously, it was begun before the war had even ended, and finished only a week later, product of a seventy-two-hour writing binge without sleep, fuelled by cocaine. The Argentine critic Martín Kohan compares the book's publication to an earthquake: "you would have to measure it on the Richter scale."
His literary friends described him as a "social cocaine addict", "atomic ball breaker" and evil "dandy".
Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz - Polish writer who wrote 3 absurdist novels, more than 20 absurdist plays and thousands of powerful paintings. He used peyote, cocaine , mescaline to fuel his writings/paintings.
La Onda (The Wave) - A 1960's Mexican artistic movement which emphasised use of drugs to produce great works of music, literature and cinema. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Onda?wprov=sfla1
Brief mentions-
Novel with cocaine by M. Ageyev
The Blind Owl by Sadegh Hedayat(written on opium)
Vladimir Sorkokin's whole ouvre
Victor Pelevin's whole ouvre
I want to discover European novels or Latin American novels rich with experiences of magic mushrooms, LSD, DMT, ayahuasca, etc. Does anyone know?
Edit - No english language works and no obvious ones. Mention writers that are slightly obscure.
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