Salt: A World History

Comment: At first glace this book may look uninteresting, I mean who would read a book about salt? I, unfortunately, didn't have a choice, I had to read it for a school assignment. Then after a few chapters I actually found myself drawn in by the information.
Using salt as the common focal point Mark Kurlansky gives an interesting retelling a of history starting with the most ancient of civilizations and through up to the present day. There are three part to this book. In the first part he goes through a little ancient history starting with the early days of China all the way to the deterioration of the great roman empire. The second part focuses mostly on European history, the conquest of new land, and the desperate attempts made by the many European powers to control the salt trade.. The last part has to do with a little more modern history, talking a little bit more about post-civil war America, England during the 1800's to today, and the discovery that there existed different types of salts that could used in different industries.
All throughout this book there are also different recipes for those who want to try the food being described in the book. All in all this is a really interesting book, and prefect for people that like a little food with their history lesson.

Comment: No Kindle edition? I'm checking Salt out from the library.
Many of the author's other books have Kindle editions.
Penguin publishing: You just lost a sale.

Comment: This book is exactly what it says it is: a world history lesson focused on salt, and the industries to which it is important. It will probably seem quite dry to most people, but I couldn't put it down. Mark Kurlansky has a particular voice in his writing that works for me, and it flows fairly nicely considering the time and geographical shifts. I recommend this book to anyone I know who is interested in food, and many have enjoyed it.

Comment: Salt was indeed crucial to the development of human civilization: it preserved meat and fish, and provided crucial nutrients for our mental and physical development. It was for our ancestors as important a commodity as oil and water are for us today.

But to write a book about salt is as challenging and as ambitious as trying to write a book about water or oxygen or even about thinking. The result is that this book is scattered all over the place, and it's difficult to get drawn into this book. Can anyone really care about salt this much?

Comment: The following is a review I posted on the weblog, The Literate Man ([...]), on April 29, 2010:

Who knew a book about a cooking condiment could be so exciting?

It's hard to imagine a world where salt is more than just a food complement, but for most of human history no element on earth has played a more critical role in society's evolution than sodium chloride. In the aptly named, Salt: A World History, author Mark Kurlansky paints a rich and fascinating portrait of salt's pivotal role in shaping the world as we know it.

Gold? Diamonds? Oil? All are mere historical footnotes compared with the role salt has occupied over the past five millennia of the human journey. In fact, until quite recently, salt was the most valuable commodity on the planet. Wars were waged, civilizations collapsed, and empires rose and fell as people throughout the ages sought to acquire this once scarce mineral. Salt has since shed its glamour with only the poorest and most backward countries still in the salt mining business and damning medical evidence curtailing its consumption. But Kurlansky transports us to a time when salt was the cornerstone of life and the epitome of opulence.

Transcending both time and space this running historical narrative takes us from China in 5,000 BC to England in the 19th century as this swift-paced tale unfolds. From the key ingredient in early animal domestication and antiseptic in Egyptian times, to soldier pay in Roman times, to a food preservative during the European Age of Exploration, salt has been humanity's companion and catalyst through the ages. It's done more than just spice up our food, harden our arteries, and provided us with witty sayings (ever wonder where the expression "salt of the earth" came from?) and that long forgotten and intriguing past is compellingly revealed in this 449-page ode to NaCl.

Kurlansky has a rare talent for making the mundane fascinating (he's also written mesmerizing biographical accounts of both the cod fish and the oyster) and his powers are at their greatest in this enthralling read. You'll never look at a salt shaker the same way again.