Dirty Words: Writings on the History and Culture of Pollution - Softcover

A collection of entertaining and provocative essays on the culture and history of pollution. Each piece challenges the reader to take a closer look at the current boom in environmental concern. It questions why we decided to saturate our land in pesticides, how a particular panda came to be redesigned to sell the environment as a serious concern and how the whale became a cuddly toy. The book also examines pollution in literature - the famous fogs of Sherlock Holmes and the LA smogs of Raymond Chandler's detective stories. The essays cover the past, present and theorize about what we can look forward to.