CULTURE
Recommended Reading: 5 Cannabis-Loving Authors' Greatest Works
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Books that were inspired by the green.
Published on October 4, 2015

A green lifestyle wouldn't be complete without some quality reading. Some might be surprised to find out just how many creative and renowned authors considered cannabis to be a necessary component of their own lives. Without marijuana, who knows? We may have never received some of the great literary works we know and love today. 

Stephen King

Horror story genius Stephen King has actually been sober since the late 80’s, but while writing works like Carrie and The Shining, King was known to be a frequent inhaler. During an interview with High Times, King said, “I think that marijuana should not only be legal, I think it should be a cottage industry.”  

Recommended reading: The Stand, It, Salem’s Lot, The Green Mile, & Pet Sematary.

Warning: Paranoia is an inevitable side-effect of reading a Stephen King novel while high.

Susan Sontag

Susan Sontag is a cultural critic living in Greenwich Village. She reported on important conflicts of her time, including the Vietnam War, the Bosnian War, and the AIDS epidemic. Sontag, who passed away in 2004, was always strongly opinionated and said, “I think marijuana is much better than liquor. I think a society which is addicted to a very destructive and unhealthy drug - namely alcohol - certainly has no right to complain or be sanctimonious or censor the use of a drug which is much less harmful.”  

Recommended reading: The Way We Live Now or Against Interpretation

Jennifer Egan

Jennifer Egan, author of the Pulitzer-prize winning novel A Visit from the Goon Squad, has written of her marijuana-use as a teenager growing up in San Francisco. Read Egan’s Once Upon a Life essay, where she writes of her high school best friends, her obsession with Patti Smith and smoking her first joint.  

Recommended reading: If you’ve already read A Visit from the Goon Squad already, check out The Keep.

Hunter S. Thompson

Hunter S. Thompson, author of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and pioneer of Gonzo journalism, has been frank about his relationship with cannabis. “I have always loved marijuana. It has been a source of joy and comfort to me for many years. And I still think of it as a basic staple of life, along with beer and ice and grapefruits- and millions of Americans agree with me,” Thompson had said. Early into his career as a journalist, Thompson moved to San Francisco and became immersed in the hippie culture which, at the time, was closely associated to cannabis. Until his death in 2005, Thompson was an advocate for drug legalization and on the advisory board of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.  

Recommended reading: Hell’s Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs, Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail in '72, and Thompson's scathing obituary for Richard Nixon

Lee Child

Lee Child, also known as Jim Grant, is a thriller writer whose novels are centered around one protagonist, Jack Reacher. 60-years-old and living in New York City, Child has been very open about his regular cannabis-use. “I’ve been smoking weed for 44 years, five nights a week. I’m the poster boy to prove it doesn’t do you much harm.” The author says he works better after smoking cannabis, and considering more than 40 million copies of his books have been sold in 75 different countries, he seems to be right.  

Recommended reading: Killing Floor, the first of his electrifying series.

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Isabel Rolston
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Isabel is a student at Eugene Lang College the New School for Liberal Arts in New York City and is studying non-fiction writing, dance, and contemporary music. She is originally from Los Angeles - the Valley to be exact - and although she loves NYC, her alliance is with the West Coast. In her free time Isabel likes to dance in front of the mirror, listen to music, and smoke cannabis.
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