D.C.A. Hillman isn’t on a mission to change the world. He just wants people to understand it a little bit better.
The Madison author of “The Chemical Muse: Drug Use and the Roots of Western Civilization” is trying to open a few eyes about ancient history. Drugs were an everyday part of life in ancient Greece and Rome, Hillman writes in the book, and an influence on the arts, philosophy and politics on which our own culture is based.
(Carol Newlands, chair of the Classics department, is quoted.)