Salt: A World History - Softcover

Kurlansky, Mark

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0099281996 ISBN 13: 9780099281993

Publisher: Vintage, 2003

Synopsis

Homer called it a divine substance. Plato described it as especially dear to the gods. As Mark Kurlansky so brilliantly relates here, salt has shaped civilisation from the beginning, and its story is a glittering, often surprising part of the history of mankind. Wars have been fought over salt and, while salt taxes secured empires across Europe and Asia, they have also inspired revolution - Gandhi's salt march in 1930 began the overthrow of British rule in India.

From the rural Sichuan province where the last home-made soya sauce is produced to the Cheshire brine springs that supplied salt around the globe, Mark Kurlansky has produced a kaleidoscope of world history, a multi-layered masterpiece that blends political, commercial, scientific, religious and culinary records into a rich and memorable tale.

About this title

Review:

Very early in his book, Kurlansky refers to an essay by the psychoanalyst Ernest Jones on man's obsession with salt. Whether or not man, in general, has an obsession with salt may be debatable. That one man in particular--Mark Kurlansky--has, is made more than clear by this unusual and enjoyable book. He seems to have set out to put between the covers of one volume every single fact about the history of man's relationship with salt that he could unearth. How the Ancient Greeks salted their tuna. Why the Mayans used salt as a medicine in healing rituals. The story of the great salt merchants of China. The French tax on salt and how its injustice contributed to the French Revolution. Why Gandhi chose salt as a symbol of the Raj's oppression. Kurlansky ranges through the centuries and across the world to tell the story of salt. As a prize-winning food writer he is particularly good on the ways salt has shaped our eating habits and once again, as in his earlier book Cod, he seasons his text with recipes he has come across in his research. In the course of 450 pages the reader may occasionally feel that here is a book that tells one more about salt than one wants to know but, for most of those pages, Kurlansky's enthusiasm, knowledge and style create an engrossing tale.--Nick Rennison

Review:

"Refreshing and invigorating, full of fascinating fact" (Independent on Sunday)

"This is an extraordinary little book, unputdownable, written in the most lyrical, flowing style which paints vivid pictures and, at the same time, punches into place hard facts that stop you dead in your tracks. A compulsive read" (Sir Roy Strong Express on Sunday)

"Crisply and elegantly written - piques the appetite and sharpens the senses" (Sunday Telegraph)

"A rich stew about every salt-influenced concoction and creation, from the first sausages and cured hams and fish sauces to the invention of parmesan, tomato ketchup and Tabasco sauce" (Financial Times)

"An entertainingly anecdotal and lovingly partisan history." (Independent)

About this edition

• Publisher: Vintage
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0099281996
• ISBN 13: 9780099281993
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 4
• Number of pages: 496