return to home
 
 
Member Login
Library Login
BookBrowse Mobile facebook      twitter      Bookmark and Share      mail to a friend  Email
 
  This Week's Recommendations    |     Hardcovers Coming Soon    |     Paperbacks Coming Soon    |     Recent Hardcovers    |     Recent Paperbacks
   Genres   |    Settings   |    Time Periods   |    Themes   |    Favorites   |    Award Winners   |    Book Finder   |    Surprise Me!   |    Tag cloud
   Recent Interviews    |     All Interviews    |     Author Bios    |     Author Websites    |     Pronunciation Guide
   Free Newsletters   |    Wordplay   |    Book Giveaway   |    BookBrowse Polls   |    Literary Quotes   |    Personality Quiz   |    Gift Membership
   Recent Membership Magazines    |     Magazine Archives     |     Invite the Author    |     My Reading List    |     First Impressions    |     My Account
   Editor's Blog    |     Best Reader Reviews    |     Book News    |     Meet the Reviewers    |     Stay In Touch
   About Us   |    Tour   |    Member Benefits   |    Join   |    Gift Memberships   |    Library Subscriptions   |    FAQ   |    People Say   |    Contact Us
PLA 2010
Search BookBrowse
Suggested Links
This Book's Themes:
Free Twice-Monthly Newsletters
The Vagrant
The Wild Things

Win This Book!




The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo: Now a Major Motion Picture

Enter To Win Now!


wordplay
Solve this clue:
"T S I Willing B T F I W"

and be entered to win....
New Author
Interviews
Ingrid Law
Ingrid Law talks about the inspiration for Savvy
S.J. Parris
S.J. Parris writes about her inspiration for Heresy, which masterfully blends true events with fiction into a page-turning murder mystery set on the sixteenth-century Oxford University campus.
John Hart
In a letter to his readers, John Hart talks about becoming a writer and the challenges he faced in writing The Last Child.
Adam Haslett
A conversation with Adam Haslett, author of Union Atlantic, a deeply affecting portrait of the modern gilded age, the first decade of the twenty-first century.
No Stars
   Summary and Book Reviews

Salt: Summary and book reviews of Salt by Mark Kurlansky, plus links to an excerpt from Salt and a biography of Mark Kurlansky.

Salt Salt
A World History
by Mark Kurlansky
Hardcover: Jan 2002,
352 pages.
Paperback: Feb 2003,
496 pages.

Publication information
Read an Excerpt
Reader Reviews

Author Biography
Books by this Author
Critics' Opinion:   very good
Readers' Rating:  2.5 Stars
About BookBrowse Rankings
Buy This Book
Themes Members Only Read-Alikes Members Only Add to Reading List  Members Only
Book Summary
award image A BookBrowse Favorite Book

Homer called salt a divine substance. Plato described it as especially dear to the gods. Today we take salt for granted, a common, inexpensive substance that seasons food or clears ice from roads, a word used casually in expressions ("salt of the earth," take it with a grain of salt") without appreciating their deeper meaning. However, as Mark Kurlansky so brilliantly relates in his world-encompassing new book, salt—the only rock we eat—has shaped civilization from the very beginning. Its story is a glittering, often surprising part of the history of mankind.

Until about 100 years ago, when modern chemistry and geology revealed how prevalent it is, salt was one of the most sought-after commodities, and no wonder, for without it humans and animals could not live. Salt has often been considered so valuable that it served as currency, and it is still exchanged as such in places today. Demand for salt established the earliest trade routes, across unknown oceans and the remotest of deserts: the city of Jericho was founded almost 10,000 years ago as a salt trading center. Because of its worth, salt has provoked and financed some wars, and been a strategic element in others, such as the American Revolution and the Civil War. Salt taxes secured empires across Europe and Asia and have also inspired revolution (Gandhi's salt march in 1930 began the overthrow of British rule in India); indeed, salt has been central to the age-old debate about the rights of government to tax and control economies.

The story of salt encompasses fields as disparate as engineering, religion, and food, all of which Kurlansky richly explores. Few endeavors have inspired more ingenuity than salt making, from the natural gas furnaces of ancient China to the drilling techniques that led to the age of petroleum, and salt revenues have funded some of the greatest public works in history, including the Erie Canal, and even cities (Syracuse, New York). Salt's ability to preserve and to sustain life has made it a metaphorical symbol in all religions. Just as significantly, salt has shaped the history of foods like cheese, sauerkraut, olives, and more, and Kurlansky, an award-winning food writer, conveys how they have in turn molded civilization and eating habits the world over.

Salt is veined with colorful characters, from Li Bing, the Chinese bureaucrat who built the world's first dam in 250 BC, to Pattillo Higgins and Anthony Lucas who, ignoring the advice of geologists, drilled an east Texas salt dome in 1901 and discovered an oil reserve so large it gave birth to the age of petroleum. From the sinking salt towns of Cheshire in England to the celebrated salt mine on Avery Island in Louisiana; from the remotest islands in the Caribbean where roads are made of salt to rural Sichaun province, where the last home-made soya sauce is made, Mark Kurlansky has produced a kaleidoscope of history, a multi-layered masterpiece that blends economic, scientific, political, religious, and culinary records into a rich and memorable tale.

Book Reviews


Very Good  Kirkus Reviews
Starred Review. A lively social history that does for salt what Kurlansky previously did for cod....Enlightening and delighting as he goes, Kurlansky is, as Jane Grigson before him, a peerless food historian.

Very Good  Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Only Mark Kurlansky, winner of the James Beard Award for Excellence in Food Writing for Cod A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World, could woo readers toward such an off-beat topic of Salt A World History...Throughout his engaging, well-researched history, Kurlansky sprinkles witty asides and amusing anecdotes. A piquant blend of the historic, political, commercial, scientific and culinary, the book is sure to entertain as well as educate.

Very Good  Library Journal
Starred Review. In his latest work, Kurlansky is in command of every facet of this topic, and he conveys his knowledge in a readable, easy style. Deftly leading readers around the world and across cultures and centuries, he takes an inexpensive, mundane item and shows how it has influenced and affected wars, cultures, governments, religions, societies, economies, cooking (there are a few recipes), and foods…An entertaining, informative read, this is highly recommended…

Very Good  Booklist
Starred Review. Kurlansky thinks big. First, there was Cod A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World (1997), then The Basque History of the World (1999), and now, the world history of a subject bigger than one of the most important food commodities in the West, bigger than the oldest extant European culture--that culinary sine qua non, salt.... Tasty, very tasty!

Good  Boston Globe
In Salt A World History, Mark Kurlansky takes a substance that shaped the fortunes of cultures from ancient China to Britain to the Americas and runs with it...Although not strictly food history, Salt is at its most winning in the chapters telling of people's obsession with it for flavoring and preserving meat and vegetables...But it's really the quirks that seem to interest Kurlansky and make this book fascinating. These sorts of stories sustain the book's narrative until, by the end, when Kurlansky reports on haute cuisine's interest in unusual, large-grain salts, this book of minutely researched data and history can literally make the mouth water.

Good  Los Angeles Times Book Review
Kurlansky continues to prove himself remarkably adept at taking a most unlikely candidate and telling its tale with epic grandeur...With Salt, Kurlansky adds his name to this list, rising splendidly to the challenge of showing us the world that can be found in a mere grain of salt.

Very Good  Seattle Post Intelligencer
Salt is an endlessly fascinating topic, which is why Kurlansky chose to write about it...Even with all the intriguing stories that Kurlansky strings together, gthere were many more he couldn't share...This single volume is savory enough.

Author Blurb  Anthony Bourdain author of the best-selling Kitchen Confidential
Salt is the fascinating, indispensable history of an indispensable ingredient. Like Kurlansky's earlier work, Cod, it's a must-have book for any serious cook or foodie.

Write a Review
This Book's Themes:
Read-Alikes:
Other books by this author
Buy This Book:
Addall Logo

Become a Member
Advertisement
Editor's Choice
  •  Mar 18 
  •  Mar 16 
  •  Mar 14 
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand
Helen Simonson
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand Jacket You are about to travel to Edgecombe St. Mary, a small village in the English countryside filled with rolling hills, thatched cottages, and a cast of characters both hilariously original and as familiar as the members of your own family.
The Postmistress
Sarah Blake
The Postmistress Jacket The Postmistress is an unforgettable tale of the secrets we must bear, or bury. It is about what happens to love during war­time, when those we cherish leave. And how every story-of love or war-is about looking left when we should have been looking right.
Heresy
S.J. Parris
Heresy Jacket Masterfully blending true events with fiction, this blockbuster historical thriller delivers a page-turning murder mystery set on the sixteenth-century Oxford University campus.
The Swan Thieves
Elizabeth Kostova
The Swan Thieves Jacket Kostova's masterful new novel travels from American cities to the coast of Normandy, from the late 19th century to the late 20th, from young love to last love. The Swan Thieves is a story of obsession, history's losses, and the power of art to preserve human hope.
36 Arguments for the Existence of God
Rebecca Goldstein
36 Arguments for the Existence of God Jacket A hilarious, heartbreaking, and intellectually captivating novel about the rapture and torments of religious experience in all its variety.
The Birthday Present
Recent Reader Reviews
Wesley the Owl by Stacey O'Brien
I read this book in two days and found it so refreshing. Although you will learn a great deal about barn owls by reading it, the book is not just ... read more
The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
I enjoyed reading this book, however, feel that this is not completely her own ideas. This books remembers me of a cross between 'ghost','Sixth ... read more
Shanghai Girls by Lisa See
Lisa See has written a great book! This story is satisfying on many levels, some scenes horrifying, but seemingly truthful, and her handling of the ... read more
RSS RSS feed More...  
Most Viewed This Week
1. Brooklyn Bridge
Karen Hesse
2. Three Cups of Tea
David O. Relin, Greg Mortenson
3. The Glass Castle
Jeannette Walls
4. The Notebook
Nicholas Sparks
5. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
John Boyne
More...
Book Club Recommendations
Shanghai Girls
by Lisa See
Paperback (Feb/10)
Lowboy
by John Wray
Paperback (Feb/10)
Honolulu
by Alan Brennert
Paperback (Feb/10)
When Will There Be Good News?
by Kate Atkinson
Paperback (Jan/10)
More...
First Impressions
Members read and review books often months before they're published. See what they think in First Impressions!
The Girl Who Fell from the Sky
by Heidi W. Durrow
4.5 Stars            (Feb/10)
Secret Daughter
by Shilpi Somaya Gowda
4.5 Stars            (Mar/10)
Still Life
by Melissa Milgrom
3.5 Stars            (Mar/10)
Arcadia Falls
by Carol Goodman
Four Stars            (Mar/10)
The Journal Keeper
by Phyllis Theroux
4.5 Stars            (Mar/10)
The Queen's Lover
by Vanora Bennett
4.5 Stars            (Mar/10)
More...
   Most Recent Blog Entries
Author as Advocate
The Story Behind "The Forty Rules of Love" by Elif Shafak
A Warm Welcome to Major Pettigrew
How Becoming Published Changed My Life (in ways I did not expect)
rss  RSS   rss  subscribe
  Latest BookBrowse News
Amazon 'buy button' rumors abound (Mar 18 2010)
Rumors swirled today that Amazon could revoke the buy buttons for books by Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, Penguin, or Hachette if the major publishers can't... Full Story
Amazon's e-pricing threats (Mar 18 2010)
With Apple's iPad launch just weeks away, Amazon raised the stakes again when it threatened to stop directly selling the books of some publishers online... Full Story
rss RSS feed More...
BookBrowse Poll
Q: Did your parents/caregivers read to you regularly as a child? If so, how old were you when they stopped?
Younger than 5 years old
Around 5-7 years old
8-10 years old
11-13 years old
14 years or older
They never or rarely read to me
I don't remember
HOME Submissions | Advertising | Showcase | Library Subscriptions | Media Inquiries | Reviewers | Contact Us |   Email this page to a friend
addall.com - external link
Visit AddAll.com to compare and save at 41 bookstores!
Searching for used books? Search 20,000+ dealers!
 
Compare music prices  |  Compare movie prices
One Percent