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Cigarettes Are Sublime
Cigarettes are bad for you; that is why they are so good. With its origins in the author’s urgent desire to stop smoking, Cigarettes Are Sublime offers a provocative look at the literary, philosophical, and cultural history of smoking. Richard Klein focuses on the dark beauty, negative pleasures, and exacting benefits attached to tobacco use and to cigarettes in particular. His appreciation of paradox and playful use of hyperbole lead the way on this aptly ambivalent romp through the cigarette in war, movies (the "Humphrey Bogart cigarette"), literature, poetry, and the reflections of Sartre to show that cigarettes are a mixed blessing, precisely sublime.
232 pages, Perfect Paperback
First published November 23, 1993
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
December 8, 2020
Preporuka za sve koji ne mogu da zamisle dan bez cigarete; za one koji, poput Tomasa Mana, smatraju da je dan bez duvana vrhunac bljutavosti!
Ne želim da zvučim eklektički, da kopiram podatke i teze o cigaretama iz knjige. Jok. Ukratko ću reći da je knjiga za one koji uživaju u konzumaciji duvana, te da će isti, nakon čitanja, uživati još više. Radi se esejima, knjizi koju je autor počeo da piše kako bi ostavio duvan, što je za posledicu imalo dubinsko istraživanje, pokušaj da se dođe do odgovora na pitanje "šta je toliko privlačno u tom otrovu?". Filozofsko razmatanje dopunjeno je istorijskim pregledom, kao i sociološkom analizom samog čina pušenja. Pored toga, analizira se i pojava cigareta u književnim delima, poeziji, drami i filmu "Kazablanka". Prisutna je, naravno, i hiperbola tj. veličanje duvana i toga šta isti predstavlja. Ali baš zbog tog zanesenjačkog, pesničkog pristupa, knjiga dobija na dodatnom kvalitetu.
Zaboravih da pomenem: objavljena je u okviru edicije "Cveće zla" koja obuhvata razne interesantne, "kontroverzne" knjige. Između ostalog, objavili su i: Svaštara o travi koju takođe preporučujem.
Ne želim da zvučim eklektički, da kopiram podatke i teze o cigaretama iz knjige. Jok. Ukratko ću reći da je knjiga za one koji uživaju u konzumaciji duvana, te da će isti, nakon čitanja, uživati još više. Radi se esejima, knjizi koju je autor počeo da piše kako bi ostavio duvan, što je za posledicu imalo dubinsko istraživanje, pokušaj da se dođe do odgovora na pitanje "šta je toliko privlačno u tom otrovu?". Filozofsko razmatanje dopunjeno je istorijskim pregledom, kao i sociološkom analizom samog čina pušenja. Pored toga, analizira se i pojava cigareta u književnim delima, poeziji, drami i filmu "Kazablanka". Prisutna je, naravno, i hiperbola tj. veličanje duvana i toga šta isti predstavlja. Ali baš zbog tog zanesenjačkog, pesničkog pristupa, knjiga dobija na dodatnom kvalitetu.
Zaboravih da pomenem: objavljena je u okviru edicije "Cveće zla" koja obuhvata razne interesantne, "kontroverzne" knjige. Između ostalog, objavili su i: Svaštara o travi koju takođe preporučujem.
June 10, 2008
This fucking book. God do I miss cigarettes.
January 10, 2021
obavezno štivo za ljubitelje duhana i za one koji žele razumjeti nas koji to jesmo.
April 15, 2010
I thought this book was amazing. It's literary criticism, film criticism, philosophy, text deconstruction, and an elegy to cigarettes all in just over 200 pages. This is the kind of stuff that Brendan calls "grad school trash," but that I adore.
According to Klein (who wrote this book to help him quit smoking), cigarettes are sublime in the Kantian sense of sublimity: beautiful, but counter-purposive. We all know that the cool kids smoke and Klein makes smoking seem a great deal more appealing than it actually is; he notes that priggish anti-smoking zealotry has often had an undercurrent of misogyny, that one can measure the overall freedom of a society by how many of its citizens (particularly women) smoke, the old Hollywood codes that smoking = sex, and the importance of cigarettes to soldiers in wartime. This is all interspersed with almost purplish prose in praise of the cigarette as the "prayer" of our time and interesting black-and-white photographs of the famed and non-famous alike with their cigarette poses.
A caveat: Klein is a professor of French, and most of his literary examples derive from French literature - hence, there is plenty of French to be found in the book. Most of it is translated, but several phrases sprinkled liberally throughout are not; it would help to have a basic understanding of French before attempting to read this.
According to Klein (who wrote this book to help him quit smoking), cigarettes are sublime in the Kantian sense of sublimity: beautiful, but counter-purposive. We all know that the cool kids smoke and Klein makes smoking seem a great deal more appealing than it actually is; he notes that priggish anti-smoking zealotry has often had an undercurrent of misogyny, that one can measure the overall freedom of a society by how many of its citizens (particularly women) smoke, the old Hollywood codes that smoking = sex, and the importance of cigarettes to soldiers in wartime. This is all interspersed with almost purplish prose in praise of the cigarette as the "prayer" of our time and interesting black-and-white photographs of the famed and non-famous alike with their cigarette poses.
A caveat: Klein is a professor of French, and most of his literary examples derive from French literature - hence, there is plenty of French to be found in the book. Most of it is translated, but several phrases sprinkled liberally throughout are not; it would help to have a basic understanding of French before attempting to read this.
May 9, 2023
May 8th, 2023
Re-read for a paper! Better than ever! Makes a lady want a cigarette!
July 5th, 2022
More flawed than a 5 star should be but I am glad it exists enough to give it such a stamp. And it met the criteria. Started on a 12 hour train ride and finished on a different 12 hour train ride. Probably going to think about it every day for the rest of my life.
Re-read for a paper! Better than ever! Makes a lady want a cigarette!
July 5th, 2022
More flawed than a 5 star should be but I am glad it exists enough to give it such a stamp. And it met the criteria. Started on a 12 hour train ride and finished on a different 12 hour train ride. Probably going to think about it every day for the rest of my life.
February 5, 2023
A delightful little book that is much like smoking a cigarette: initial heightened anxiety and stress, followed by the release of delicious prose and delightful anecdote
June 9, 2008
"The cigarette is a prayer for our times"
A cultural history of the Cigarette, written by someone trying to give them up.
Interesting note: I was surprised at how politically important Casablanca was to success in the Second World War.
I was also surprised to find that in contrast to our current efforts to remove smoking from public life, that smoking was an actively encouraged past-time, and a patriotic one during all our wars and revolutions. That moreover, it's always been the accessory of the soldier, the revolutionary and the artist-- And that it's power and potency to deal with the anxieties of great change, great risk, and great romance have played such a central part in the great narritive of the west, and that of freedom.
This is a great book, and i'd recommend it to any smoker.
A cultural history of the Cigarette, written by someone trying to give them up.
Interesting note: I was surprised at how politically important Casablanca was to success in the Second World War.
I was also surprised to find that in contrast to our current efforts to remove smoking from public life, that smoking was an actively encouraged past-time, and a patriotic one during all our wars and revolutions. That moreover, it's always been the accessory of the soldier, the revolutionary and the artist-- And that it's power and potency to deal with the anxieties of great change, great risk, and great romance have played such a central part in the great narritive of the west, and that of freedom.
This is a great book, and i'd recommend it to any smoker.
June 9, 2007
Klein, who is a French professor, wrote this books while quitting smoking, as a love song and farewell to cigarettes. As one might expect, it is less a sociological analysis (though since he pioneered the topic, several of those have come out, and I have them on my shelves waiting to be read) and more of a philosophical musing. What stuck with me from this one is the idea that we smoke first because it is addictive, but secondly because it is deadly, that each cigarette is a fuck you to death, a little voluntary risk that one survives each individual time. That makes a LOT of sense to me, and I was a two-pack-a-day smoker for eight years and struggled off and on to quit for another four.
November 26, 2024
Much more philosophical than I expected for a book I chose simply because it had “cigarettes” in the title. “Cigarettes are Sublime” serves as a survey of the existing references to cigarettes within media and philosophical literature. The main points I found interesting are as such. First, “sublime” has more of a negative connotation than most believe. The origin lies in explorers crossing the Alps who believed they were going to die. Surrounded by the vastness and POWER of the world around them, they succumb. Klein argues that cigarettes function in a similar way. They are neither good nor evil. Secondly, I have previously viewed my purpose in life to maximize the amount of happiness I can provide to myself and those around me for the longest period possible. Something that Klein suggested is that the definition of health being “to live the longest life possible” is not accurate. In order to lead a mentally fulfilling (and therefore healthy and happy life) one must necessarily take risks which shorten your lifespan. In this way, we as humans constantly evaluate the risk-reward of all of our decisions. To give an extreme example, if Neil Armstrong were to decide to lead the “healthiest” lifestyle possible, he would never have boarded the Apollo 11. In fact he probably would never have left his room. But, if he had done this, he would not have been a great man, and moreover have been a less mentally fulfilled man. What I’m getting at here is that I need to view my life goals in a different light. Instead of trying to maximize happiness for the maximum amount of time, I need to instead maximize the amount of happiness for the time I have here on Earth. I don’t want to be a hedonist to be clear. But rather, I need to more closely analyze what truly makes me happy and “healthy”.
June 21, 2024
Extravagant? A bit. Devious? Sublimely so. French? Inescapably.
Klein writes in the mid-twentieth century French tradition of introducing a concept; pulling your conception of that concept apart; discarding it; and advancing a new one. All the while, claiming that what he introduces is the “real” concept, free of culturally prejudiced apprehensions. Does it work? In the classically mid-twentieth French tradition, sometimes.
I think the book is well written, well intentioned, and less highbrow than all the French vocab would lead you to believe. It’s well worth a read (especially for those who regard cigarettes as THE biggest threat to public health)
Klein writes in the mid-twentieth century French tradition of introducing a concept; pulling your conception of that concept apart; discarding it; and advancing a new one. All the while, claiming that what he introduces is the “real” concept, free of culturally prejudiced apprehensions. Does it work? In the classically mid-twentieth French tradition, sometimes.
I think the book is well written, well intentioned, and less highbrow than all the French vocab would lead you to believe. It’s well worth a read (especially for those who regard cigarettes as THE biggest threat to public health)
September 4, 2021
I read it in high school. It talks about all the good aspects of cigarettes. They are arguably not that good, and mostly, as I remember are tied to values that only seem very worthy when life is oppressive, but it is a well stated work, and I enjoyed it, I remember. The author wrote about the good aspects of smoking, I remember, in an effort to quit smoking. It didn't help me, at the time, but I would quit quite a while later by other means.
April 28, 2018
Great novel romanticizing cigarettes and justifying their appeal in Klein's attempt to break his addiction. A lot of references to French literature, French literary/psychoanalytical theory (Klein was a French lit professor at Cornell), philosophy, film, books, and art in general, so don't bother reading this unless you're relatively well-read
April 25, 2022
This book would not be very well received in the public health space. The author made nicotine addiction seem very romantic and beyond scientific explanation. He vouches for the smoker's philosophy and liberty in choosing to smoke but does not mention how addictive the chemical nicotine is. I enjoyed reading about the cultural and historical impact cigarettes have had and continue to have.
November 3, 2019
This is a fine book which I picked up after reading a short passage of it in one of Dale Pendell’s works. It just wasn’t quite for me, though I appreciate the thought experiment: quitting smoking by embracing it, cherishing it as a concept, loving it and studying it.
February 3, 2024
Бедно пискарање неког академичића о вероватно најтежој болести зависности на свету. Једини закључак је да Ричард нажалост мора да остави цигарете, надам се не својом вољом и на силу.
April 17, 2024
read for my thesis, an incredibly beautiful reflection on addiction
August 10, 2024
living means picking your poison, basically
June 1, 2017
“Sigara içmek, zamanın sıradan akışını askıya alıp onun yerine daha derinlemesine işleyen bir zaman koymak düşüncesiyle ilintilidir baştanberi, şiirsel duyarlığın çekimine karşı koyamadığı bir kayıtsızlık, bir vazgeçiş duygusunun koşullarını yaratır, onu serpiltir” (16)
“Sigara, yazara geleneği Petrarca’ya kadar giden bir esini coşkuyla sunar bir peri suretinde. Sigara, gerek tınısıyla, gerek simgeledikleriyle dişidir, şairler de bu dişiye şiirler döktürmekten geri kalmamışlardır, özellikle karanlık çağdaş güzelliğine” (30)
“Sigarayı övmek, alkışlanan, el üstünde tutulan güzelliğin estetik bir doyum ya da dinginlik yerine, irkiltici hazlardan serpilme Elem Çiçekleri’ni derlemektir bir bakıma” (31)
Fransızcadaki ‘Türk gibi sigara içmek’ deyimi
“Sigara içmek genellikle hiçbir şey yapmamak sayılır; eylem sayılmaz. Eyleme eşlik edebilecek bir etkinlik, bir tavırdır ama eylemin kendisi değildir ... eylemsizliktir aslında” =Sartre’ı sigaranın yararlarını yoksaymakla suçluyor
“Sigaranın yararsızlığı üstüne bu söylemin geliştirilmesi sırasında içilen sigaraların önemli payı gözardı edilmiştir” (52)
Sigara – odaklanma aracı
“Sigara içmek, somut bir şeyin, tütünün tüketilmesi karşılığında çevremdeki dünyayo kendime maletmenin verdiği sonsuz kazançla dengelenen bir ‘adak sunma törenine’ dönüşüyor.”
Sigarasız hayat, yaşanmaya değmez.
“Sigaradan nefret etmek, asla sigara içmeye engel değildir; habire ‘son sigara’yı içme özrünü sağlar yalnızca. Sigaradan nefret, sevilesi bir nefrettir” (117)
Zeno’nun Bilinci’ndeki sigarayı bırakma alışkanlığı
“Sigara içmek; sıkıcı, tekdüze, içine kapalı, kutsal değersiz zavallı benliklerimizden sıyrılma olanağı tanıyor bize, bildik iç dünyamızın dışındaki dünyanın bir parçası olmayı denememize izin veriyor. Sigaranın dumanı, havayı soluduğumuzu getiriyor aklımıza, aslında her zaman içimizin dışında olduğumuzu, ağzımızdan çıkar çıkmaz yumuşacık kuş-kanatlı bir sözcüğe dönüşen havayı soluduğumuzu” (233)
“Sigara, yazara geleneği Petrarca’ya kadar giden bir esini coşkuyla sunar bir peri suretinde. Sigara, gerek tınısıyla, gerek simgeledikleriyle dişidir, şairler de bu dişiye şiirler döktürmekten geri kalmamışlardır, özellikle karanlık çağdaş güzelliğine” (30)
“Sigarayı övmek, alkışlanan, el üstünde tutulan güzelliğin estetik bir doyum ya da dinginlik yerine, irkiltici hazlardan serpilme Elem Çiçekleri’ni derlemektir bir bakıma” (31)
Fransızcadaki ‘Türk gibi sigara içmek’ deyimi
“Sigara içmek genellikle hiçbir şey yapmamak sayılır; eylem sayılmaz. Eyleme eşlik edebilecek bir etkinlik, bir tavırdır ama eylemin kendisi değildir ... eylemsizliktir aslında” =Sartre’ı sigaranın yararlarını yoksaymakla suçluyor
“Sigaranın yararsızlığı üstüne bu söylemin geliştirilmesi sırasında içilen sigaraların önemli payı gözardı edilmiştir” (52)
Sigara – odaklanma aracı
“Sigara içmek, somut bir şeyin, tütünün tüketilmesi karşılığında çevremdeki dünyayo kendime maletmenin verdiği sonsuz kazançla dengelenen bir ‘adak sunma törenine’ dönüşüyor.”
Sigarasız hayat, yaşanmaya değmez.
“Sigaradan nefret etmek, asla sigara içmeye engel değildir; habire ‘son sigara’yı içme özrünü sağlar yalnızca. Sigaradan nefret, sevilesi bir nefrettir” (117)
Zeno’nun Bilinci’ndeki sigarayı bırakma alışkanlığı
“Sigara içmek; sıkıcı, tekdüze, içine kapalı, kutsal değersiz zavallı benliklerimizden sıyrılma olanağı tanıyor bize, bildik iç dünyamızın dışındaki dünyanın bir parçası olmayı denememize izin veriyor. Sigaranın dumanı, havayı soluduğumuzu getiriyor aklımıza, aslında her zaman içimizin dışında olduğumuzu, ağzımızdan çıkar çıkmaz yumuşacık kuş-kanatlı bir sözcüğe dönüşen havayı soluduğumuzu” (233)
June 26, 2014
This is the best book I've ever found on the subject of cigarettes, their history, and on quitting them if you're addicted. It's not a how-to, it's an expose filled with rich history, and social commentary and you relate (I did anyway) to Mr. Klein. I've had the hardcover of this book for over 20 years but when I rediscovered it after as many years smoking while trying to quit, it really helped me!
May 14, 2014
This "book" was hard work.
It is supposed to be a contemplation on the art of smoking.... in fact, it was just a self indulgent, poorly written, scantily researched, poorly constructed, rather boring essay about people that have smoked.
Something the author knocked up between fags possibly? Sadly, the writing on the fag packet itself will probably be a more interesting read for most people.
It is supposed to be a contemplation on the art of smoking.... in fact, it was just a self indulgent, poorly written, scantily researched, poorly constructed, rather boring essay about people that have smoked.
Something the author knocked up between fags possibly? Sadly, the writing on the fag packet itself will probably be a more interesting read for most people.
May 27, 2017
I read this for informative and research reasons. Indeed it was very informative; it covered art, politics, history it gave some honest and unconventional opinions on health and addiction. I rated it three stars because it was boring at times but for the price I paid it's a useful book.
February 22, 2008
How to carry on smoking despite the task that Richard set himself in writing the novel, but it truly is an ode to cigarettes, and absolutely lovingly drawn (excuse the pun) out.
May 5, 2008
Sublime as in "a moment of relief from life's shitty monotony."
February 27, 2014
Best book I've read about what smoking really is, what it means.
September 15, 2016
This is actually a fascinating commentary on modernity, hyperbolically written and fun throughout.
Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews