Editing Laudanum (section)

==Fiction==
{{In popular culture|section|date=December 2024}}
=== Literature ===
*In [[Mary Shelley]]'s novel ''[[Frankenstein]]'' (1818), Victor Frankenstein takes laudanum as his only means of sleeping and thus preserving his life while in recovery from months of fever and a series of horrible events.<ref>{{cite book|title=Frankenstein| vauthors = Shelley M | author-link1 = Mary Shelley |pages=197–198|quote=Ever since my recovery from the fever I had been in the custom of taking every night a small quantity of laudanum; for it was by means of this drug only that I was enabled to gain the rest necessary for the preservation of life. Oppressed by the recollection of my various misfortunes, I now swallowed double my usual quantity and soon slept profoundly. But sleep did not afford me respite from thought and misery; my dreams presented a thousand objects that scared me.}}</ref>
*In [[Charles Dickens]]'s novel ''[[Oliver Twist]]'' (1837), Nancy gave William "Bill" Sikes laudanum to keep him asleep while she ran away to meet Rose Maylie.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/50/oliver-twist/978/chapter-47-fatal-consequences/|title=Chapter 47: Fatal Consequences. &#124; Oliver Twist &#124; Charles Dickens &#124; Lit2Go ETC|website=etc.usf.edu}}</ref>
*In ''[[Uncle Tom's Cabin]]'' (1852), an anti-slavery novel by [[Harriet Beecher Stowe]], an enslaved woman named Cassy talks about how she killed her newborn by laudanum overdose to spare him from experiencing the horrors of slavery.<ref>{{cite book|url=http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/203|title=Uncle Tom's Cabin | vauthors = Stowe HB | author-link1 = Harriet Beecher Stowe |date=January 13, 2006|via=Project Gutenberg}}</ref>
*In the novel ''[[Silas Marner: The Weaver of Raveloe]]'' by [[George Eliot]] (Mary Ann Evans) (1861), Silas finds and adopts a two-year old girl who had wandered into his house. The girl had been abandoned while walking with her opium-addicted mother, Molly Farren, who had fallen asleep in the snow and died. Earlier in the novel, in Chapter 3, it is specified that she uses laudanum.''... if Molly should take a drop too much laudanum some day, and make a widower of you.''<ref>{{cite book|chapter-url=http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/550|title=''Silas Marner: The Weaver of Raveloe''| vauthors = Eliot G |date=1861|publisher=London: William Blackwood and Sons|chapter=3|page=19|access-date=2021-03-08}}</ref>
*A laudanum-addicted character also appeared in Wilkie Collins' novel ''[[Armadale (novel)|Armadale]]'' (1864–1866).<ref>{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/stream/armadale02collgoog#page/n140/mode/1up|title=''Armadale''| vauthors = Collins W |date=1866|publisher=London: Smith, Elder & Co.|page=122|access-date=2014-07-03}}</ref>
*[[Wilkie Collins]]' novel ''[[The Moonstone]]'' (1868) features laudanum "as an essential ingredient of the plot." Collins based his description of the drug's effects on his own experiences with it.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/1991/nov/21/biography.wilkiecollins|title=Heroine, and after that the laudanum| vauthors = Clayton S |date=November 21, 1991|work=[[The Guardian]]|access-date=2014-07-03}}</ref> 
*Laudanum appears in [[Charles Baudelaire]]'s prose poem ''The Double Room'', published in his collection ''[[Le Spleen de Paris]]'' in 1869.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/283741|title=Four-Page Translation of Charles Baudelaire's Prose Poem "The Double Room"|website=The Met Museum|date=August 1926 }}</ref>
*In the novel ''[[Anna Karenina]]'' (1878) by [[Leo Tolstoy]], the eponymous character becomes addicted to laudanum.
*The [[Sherlock Holmes]] short story ''[[The Man with the Twisted Lip]]'' by [[Arthur Conan Doyle]] (1891) contains a character who is addicted to laudanum. 
*In the novel ''[[Red Harvest]]'' (1929) by [[Dashiel Hammett]], [[The Continental Op]] drinks gin doped with laudanum and has a series of strange dreams before awakening to find himself framed for murder.
*Laudanum is portrayed as the surgical drug of choice for fifteenth-century physicians in [[Lawrence Schoonover]]'s novel ''The Burnished Blade'' (1948), the plot of which deals in part with the smuggling of expensive raw opium into France from the [[Empire of Trebizond]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://oudl.osmania.ac.in/bitstream/handle/OUDL/8081/212450_The_Burnished_Blade.pdf?sequence=2|title=''The Burnished Blade''| vauthors = Shellabarger S |date=1949|publisher=London: Macmillan & Co.|pages=145, 184–187|access-date=2014-07-03|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140714173422/http://oudl.osmania.ac.in/bitstream/handle/OUDL/8081/212450_The_Burnished_Blade.pdf?sequence=2|archive-date=2014-07-14|url-status=dead}}</ref>
*In [[William Faulkner]]'s novel ''[[Requiem for a Nun]]'' (1951), Compson, Doctor Peabody, and Ratcliffe give whiskey tainted with laudanum to a group of rowdy lynchers and a militia band that had joined together. Upon their falling asleep, they were gathered up and locked in jail while still unconscious.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.potolkimaker.com/second/William-Faulkner/requiem-for-a-nun.html|title= Requiem for a Nun | vauthors = Faulkner W | author-link1 = William Faulkner | editor = Administrator |website=www.potolkimaker.com|access-date=2016-09-11|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160918202623/http://www.potolkimaker.com/second/William-Faulkner/requiem-for-a-nun.html|archive-date=2016-09-18|url-status=dead}}</ref>
*[[Stephen Maturin]], one of the main characters in [[Patrick O'Brian]]'s [[Aubrey–Maturin series]] of novels (1969–2004) about the Napoleonic wars, is a sometime laudanum addict.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZPeRfe717usC&q=dr.+stephen+maturin+surgeon&pg=PA11|title=Doctors in Fiction: Lessons from Literature| vauthors = Surawicz B |date=2009|publisher=Radcliffe Publishing|page=19|access-date=2014-07-03|isbn=9781846193286}}</ref>
*Laudanum is prescribed in [[Glendon Swarthout]]'s novel ''The Shootist'' (1975) to the character J.B. Books, played by John Wayne in [[Don Siegel]]'s movie adaptation (1976).<ref>{{cite book|title=The Shootist| vauthors = Swarthout G |publisher=Doubleday|date=1975|page=68}}</ref>
*In the book series ''[[All the Wrong Questions]]'' (2012–2015) by [[Daniel Handler]], ''Who Could That Be at This Hour?'' (2012) [[Lemony Snicket]]'s tea had laudanum. Laudanum is mentioned and used throughout the series, mostly by The Inhuman society.
*In [[Eleanor Catton]]'s novel ''[[The Luminaries]]'' (2013), and the subsequent [[The Luminaries (miniseries)|TV adaptation]] (2020), many characters are addicted to laudanum and it is used to murder Crosbie Wells.
*In [[Sara Collins|Sara Collins']] novel ''The Confessions of Frannie Langton'' (2019), and the subsequent [[The Confessions of Frannie Langton (TV series)|TV adaptation]] (2022), the titular character becomes addicted to laudanum. Another main character is also addicted and ultimately commits suicide by overdosing on laudanum.
*In [[Tommy Orange]]'s novel ''Wandering Stars'' (2024), Charles Star develops an addiction to laudanum to help him forget the intergenerational traumas caused by the [[Sanlyd Creek massacre|Sand Creek Massacre]] and deportation to [[American Indian boarding schools]].

=== Film and television ===
* In the movie ''[[The Shootist]]'' (1976) John Wayne’s gunslinger character, John Books, is prescribed laudanum by the doctor ([[James Stewart]]) for his terminal cancer.
* In the original version of the miniseries [[Roots (1977 miniseries)|''Roots'']] (1977), upon Toby's arrival to Virginia and ready for sale, the slave doctor says he'll give laudanum to the wild ones, brandy to the dull ones and "let the buyer beware".
* In [[Philippa Gregory]]'s novel ''[[Wideacre]]'' (1987), the main character Beatrice Lacey nearly becomes addicted to laudanum when her eventual husband Dr. John MacAndrew prescribes it to her after her mother's death.
* It plays a major role in the plot of James Clavell's historical novel ''[[Gai-Jin]]'' (1993).
* In the film ''[[Tombstone (film)|Tombstone]]'' (1993), Mattie Earp, [[Wyatt Earp]]'s wife is addicted to laudanum.
* In the adaptation ''[[Interview with the Vampire (film)|Interview with the Vampire]]'' (1994), which was based on the 1976 novel with the same name, Claudia uses laudanum to try to kill [[Lestat de Lioncourt|Lestat]]: Under the pretext of making peace, she offers him some drunk noble-blood twins to feed on, when she actually had them overdose on the drug, and misled Lestat into drinking dead blood which is toxic to vampires.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110148/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ql_stry_2 |title=Interview with the Vampire (film): Plot summary|website=[[IMDb]]}}</ref> 
* In the film ''[[From Hell (film)|From Hell]]'' (2001), Inspector Abberline is a user of laudanum, and [[Jack the Ripper]] also uses laudanum for making his victims sleepy.
* In the TV series ''[[Deadwood (TV series)|Deadwood]]'', (2004–2006) the town doctor recommends laudanum several times, bringing a bottle of it to a patient. Initially in the series, Alma Garrett is an addict to laudanum. Trixie is a former addict.
* In Season 1, Episode 16 of [[Murdoch Mysteries]] (2008), Dr. Ogden allegedly overdoses a patient with laudanum and is sentenced to 3 years in prison.
* In the TV show ''[[American Horror Story: Murder House]]'' (2011), laudanum is repeatedly used to drug a main character, leaving him waking up unable to remember what had occurred.
* In the TV series ''[[Outlander (TV series)|Outlander]]'' (2014), Claire uses laudanum in several episodes throughout the 18th century.
* In season 2, episode 8 of [[The Knick]] (2015), a patient takes laudanum to calm her nerves before a surgery. When she is then etherized for anesthesia, complications arise leading to her death.
* In the film ''[[Winchester (film)|Winchester]]'' (2018), Doctor Eric Price is addicted to laudanum due to his wife's suicide.<ref>{{cite web |title=Winchester (2018) |url=https://rottentomatoes.com/m/winchester |access-date=Nov 5, 2020 |work=[[Rotten Tomatoes]] |publisher=[[Fandango Media]]}}</ref> 
* In the film ''[[The Highwaymen (film)|The Highwaymen]]'' (2019), Bonnie Parker (Emily Brobst) of [[Bonnie and Clyde]] fame is addicted to laudanum.
* In the Season 1 finale of [[Netflix]] series ''[[Bridgerton]]'' (2020), Lord Archibald Featherington is implied to have died by [[forced suicide]] through ingestion of a vial of laudanum after the [[bookmaker|bookies]] he cheated learn of his deception.
* In season two of the series [[Warrior (TV series)|''Warrior'']] (2020), Officer Lee (Tom Weston-Jones) becomes addicted to laudanum when he uses it to offset his lingering head trauma.
* In the miniseries ''[[The North Water (miniseries)|The North Water]]'' (2021), the main character, a surgeon who takes a job on a whaling ship in the Arctic, is addicted to laudanum.
*In season two of the series ''[[Good Omens]]'' (2023), the demon Crowley drinks an entire glass of laudanum to prevent a poor grave robber named Elspeth from killing herself. Due to his demon constitution, he merely becomes extremely drunk from it.
*In the TV movie North and South (Based on the John Jakes novel of the same name) laudanum is used by Justin to drug Madeline to keep her trapped and complacent.