Interview with Theresa MacPhail, author of Allergic: Our Irritated Bodies in a Changing World
Theresa MacPhail, author of Allergic: Our Irritated Bodies in a Changing World recommends a fantastic feast of books!! Before jumping into the interview, please check out Theresa's book:
Description from Bookshop.org: (All links earn commission from purchases. Prices accurate at time of writing)
Allergic: Our Irritated Bodies in a Changing World
An eye-opening investigation - combining reporting, history and cutting-edge science - into allergies and their rise in recent decades
Hay fever. Peanut allergies. Eczema. Billions of people worldwide have some form of allergy; millions have one severe enough to seriously endanger their health. And over the past decade, the number of people diagnosed with allergy has been steadily increasing, an ever-growing medical burden on individuals, families, and our health care system.
Medical anthropologist Theresa MacPhail, herself an allergy sufferer whose father died of a bee sting, set out to understand why. The result is a holistic and deeply researched examination of allergies, from their first medical description in 1819 to the mind-bending new treatments that are giving patients hope. MacPhail spent years interviewing hundreds of experts, patients and activists, in an effort to understand how recent changes in our environment and lifestyle are contributing to the dramatic rise in cases globally. Pollution, chemicals, antibiotics and, increasingly, climate change are all making our immune systems become more and more irritated. But, as she shows us in Allergic, understanding what is irritating us and why will help us to craft better environments in the future-so we can all breathe easier.
Buy On:
Easons €28.00
Bookshop.org UK £23.75
Bookshop.org US $26.96
Blackwells £20.00
Waterstones £25.00
Wordery $32.05
Q. Do you have a favourite smart thinking book (and why that book)?
The Denial of Death by Ernest Becker. Description from Bookshop.org: (All links earn commission from purchases. Prices accurate at time of writing)
My favorite smart thinking book is probably The Denial of Death. It's written by another anthropologist, Ernest Becker, who had terminal cancer when he wrote it. In sum, he argues that we're so busy trying to deal with the existential terror of the knowledge that we all have to die, that we have created all of culture to mask that fear or help us to cope with it. But ironically, the more we push the thought of death from our minds, the worse off we are as a culture. It has terrible consequences. And I think about that a lot, especially now when we're dealing with wars, environmental disasters, high inflation. He seems right.
The Denial of Death
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1974 and the culmination of a life's work, The Denial of Death is Ernest Becker's brilliant and impassioned answer to the 'why' of human existence. In bold contrast to the predominant Freudian school of thought, Becker tackles the problem of the vital lie - man's refusal to acknowledge his own mortality.
The book argues that human civilisation is a defence against the knowledge that we are mortal beings. Becker states that humans live in both the physical world and a symbolic world of meaning, which is where our 'immortality project' resides. We create in order to become immortal - to become part of something we believe will last forever. In this way we hope to give our lives meaning.
In The Denial of Death, Becker sheds new light on the nature of humanity and issues a call to life and its living that still resonates decades after it was written.
Buy On:
Easons €14.00
Bookshop.org UK £10.44
Bookshop.org US $17.66
Blackwells £10.99
Waterstones £10.99
Wordery $14.09
Q. What's the most recent smart thinking book you've read (and how would you rate it)?
Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures by Merlin Sheldrake. Description from Bookshop.org: (All links earn commission from purchases. Prices accurate at time of writing)
I absolutely loved Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake. I would give it 5 out of 5 stars. The way he interweaves his own experiences as a researcher of fungi into the book, taking us into forests, making us feel like we're able to smell the soil and think about all the fungal networks that give life to the trees and other plants around them is mesmerizing. I learned a lot about how fungi work, but more importantly, I learned a lot about what we still don't understand about fungus and how important they are to our ecosystems. I think books like that really helps us all to see how 'entangled' we truly are with other species and why it's important that we start taking them into account when we make decisions.
Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures
The more we learn about fungi, the less makes sense without them. They can change our minds, heal our bodies and even help us avoid environmental disaster; they are metabolic masters, earth-makers and key players in most of nature's processes.
In Entangled Life, Merlin Sheldrake takes us on a mind-altering journey into their spectacular world, and reveals how these extraordinary organisms transform our understanding of our planet and life itself.
Buy On:
Easons €14.55
Bookshop.org UK £12.34
Bookshop.org US $17.66
Blackwells £11.62
Waterstones £12.99
Wordery $16.65
Q. Do you have a favourite childhood book?
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. Description from Blackwells: (All links earn commission from purchases. Prices accurate at time of writing)
As a kid, I absolutely loved Great Expectations. I don't know why. Maybe it's because I grew up in poverty and I liked the rags-to-riches tale. But Dickens always seemed to understand something about the human condition, and he was really entertaining and good at depicting how people live. Something about that ending still haunts me. How miserable Estella was. How she gave up love for a comfortable life and pride. It's a warning about chasing after money that I still think about regularly.
Great Expectations
Eric Carle's The Very Hungry Caterpillar is a perennial favourite with children and adults alike. Its imaginative illustration and clever cut-out detail charts the progress of a very hungry caterpillar as he eats his way through the week.
Buy On:
Easons €20.99
Bookshop.org UK £8.54
Bookshop.org US $39.95
Blackwells $16.99
Waterstones £16.99
Wordery $21.78
Q. Do you prefer reading on paper, Kindle or listening to an audiobook?
I am a paper person. I cannot do the others. I have to take notes in the margins! I have to underline! I have to be able to sniff the paper! (I know how that sounds, but I love the smell of paper books.)
Q. Do you have a favourite bookshop (and why that shop)?
Strand
I really appreciate the Strand in NYC. I like the mixture of new books and used books. I like that they have just about anything you could ever want. And I adore their rare books section. I could stand in there dreaming about starting my own rare books library for ages.
Many thanks to Theresa for recommending a fantastic feast of books!! Please don't forget to check out Allergic: Our Irritated Bodies in a Changing World.
Daryl
Image Copyrights: Penguin Books Ltd (Allergic: Our Irritated Bodies in a Changing World), Profile Books Ltd (The Denial of Death), Vintage Publishing (Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures), Penguin Random House Children's UK (Great Expectations).
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