THE SCIENCE FACTORY
Home About News Authors FAQ Search Contact
Image

NICHOLAS J. SAUNDERS is Honorary Reader in Material Culture in the Department of Anthropology at University College London. He is the author of more than twenty books and dozens of articles on archaeology and anthropology for publications including New Scientist and Nature, and has appeared on television documentaries made by the BBC and National Geographic, as well as an international range of independent television companies. He is a leading authority on the archaeology and anthropology of symbolism and memory, particularly relating to war in the twentieth century. His most recent book is ALEXANDER’S TOMB (Basic Books, 2007).

Featured titles
Where Poppies Grow
WHERE POPPIES GROW
From Flanders Fields to Helmand Province

Praise for ALEXANDER’S TOMB

An armchair Indiana Jones... his lively prose draws readers into this compelling tale of conquest, political intrigue and the aura surrounding one of history’s great heroes – PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

The poppy is a powerful and ancient symbol, embodying ideas of war, death, eternal rest and remembrance. But in the shadows behind its appearance as the common corn poppy lies the opium poppy, a deadly and unspoken influence that symbolizes the qualities of never-ending sleep and forgetfulness.

Blending the ancient past with an ever-changing present, WHERE POPPIES GROWS tells the story of the most international, successful and life-affirming symbol of commemoration in human history. The archaeologist Nicholas J. Saunders travels from Europe to the Middle East, and from the US and Canada to Australia and beyond, searching for the hidden connections and visceral stories surrounding the poppy. He interviews disabled veterans who make the red remembrance poppies; women’s groups who champion the white poppy; family members who have lost loved ones in war and take comfort from the poppy symbol; and soldiers who still fight in the opium poppy fields of Afghanistan.

At the heart of the story is the author’s account of the literary influences that established the corn poppy as the symbolic flower of the war and the dynamic duo of women – one from New York and one from France – who guaranteed its postwar emergence as an international symbol of remembrance.

Every year, eighty million people across the world buy the remembrance poppy in honour of the war dead. Unknowingly, they acknowledge a deep-rooted and formative narcosis from the distant past. Separate, but forever intertwined, the corn and opium poppies have, as WHERE POPPIES GROW reveals, generated more wealth, misery and hope than any flower in human history, and together created a global symbol of our humanity.

Publisher: Oneworld (UK)
Delivery: 31 December 2009
Pub date: Autumn 2010
Status: Proposal and sample chapters
Length: 70,000 words

All rights available excluding:
UK & Commonwealth
   THE SCIENCE FACTORY IS POWERED BY STEVE      ACCESSIBILITY HELP      W3C      RSS