Michael Pollan

Michael Pollan is a writer, teacher and activist. He is the author of nine books, including This is Your Mind on Plants (2021), How to Change Your Mind (2018), Cooked (2013), Food Rules (2009), In Defense of Food (2008), The Omnivore’s Dilemma (2006) and The Botany of Desire (2001), all of which were New York Times Bestsellers. The Omnivore’s Dilemma was named one of the ten best books of the year by both The New York Times and The Washington Post. Pollan teaches writing in the English department at Harvard and at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism, where he was the John S. and James L. Knight Professor of Journalism from 2003 to 2021. Several of his books have been adapted for television: Netflix has streamed four-part series based on Cooked and How To Change Your Mind, and The Botany of Desire and In Defense of Food both premiered on PBS. In 2015-16 Pollan was a Radcliffe Fellow and in 2010 Time Magazine named Pollan one of the 100 most influential people in the world. Pollan lives in Berkeley with his wife, the painter Judith Belzer.