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Title: Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World by Mark Kurlansky, Richard M. Davidson ISBN: 0-7887-8866-3 Publisher: Recorded Books Pub. Date: July, 2001 Format: Audio Cassette List Price(USD): $58.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.38 (71 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: A bitter ecological tale for our time
Comment: This is a fascinating book.
It's also very sad, because it illustrates the ability of modern people to almost unconsciously wipe out the natural resources of our planet. Codfish were once the "buffalo" of the oceans -- big, fat, useful and dumb. As one early explorer wrote, to catch cod all you need do is lower and bucket into the water and haul it back up full of fish. Sorta like buffalo in the days when passengers could shoot them from the windows of passing trains as a harmless sport intended solely to break the boredom of the trip.
Yes, this book is a bitter ecological tale for our time.
It is also a wonderful history of a marvelous fish. Kurlansky obviously had fun writing it, and his love of cod shows in the comfortable style of his writing. He delves into word origins for the different ways used to describe cod, and he plays with the history of a dozen or so nations to illustrate the impact one fish had on entire peoples. Plus, he includes dozens of recipes by which cod was cooked for generations.
But he also explains why such an international treasure has almost vanished.
"Whatever steps are taken, one of the greatest obstacles to restoring cod stocks off Newfoundland is an almost pathological collective denial of what has happened," Kurlansky writes near the end of the book. "Newfoundlanders seem prepared to believe anything other than they have killed off nature's bounty."
What happened? Kurlansky writes that "One Canadian journalist published an article pointing out that the cod disappeared from Newfoundland at about the same time that stocks started rebuilding in Norway.
"Clearly the northern stock had packed up and migrated to Norway," he adds. If this is the Canadian attitude, in one of the self-proclaimed best educated and wealthiest of nations, it's not hard to understand why and how Third World nations have environmental problems. My personal experience with a similar depletion is in the Sea of Cortez, where Mexican fishermen have taken about 20 years to just about exterminate the sharks.
Shrimp boats, based in Puerto Penasco, have likewise decimated the shrimp. Who's to blame? The United States, of course, because the Americans built dams on the Colorado River which prevents the river water from reaching the sea.
There's always someone else to blame.
As I said earlier, it's a sad book. Yet, it is an excellent one and perhaps one of the most appropriate to read in terms of what is fast happening to our marine life. Cod are invisible, not like cute furry little baby seals which so excited Europeans a few years ago when they saw how Canadians clubbed them to death to avoid marking the fur. If the future of our world depends on cute pictures on TV, then our future is truly in deplorable shape.
But, the fact this book exists and is written with elegance, style, wit and great insight, may persuade thick-headed politicians that even "invisible" wildlife deserves protection from our greed and ignorance. If not, and having known many politicians for many years I'm not optimistic, it is a beautiful elegy to a noble fish.
What happens when a native species disappears? Well, two centuries ago the US Southwest had some of the world's finest grasslands. Then came the Russian Thistle, an almost useless weed that choked out the grass. Now we celebrate this import in song, "See them tumbling along . . . . . the tumbling tumbleweeds."
It happens.
Rating: 1
Summary: Boring
Comment: One of the worst written books I have read in 2 years. The story: for hundreds of years there were a lot of people catching and eating cod, but then they were overfished and there are no longer giant stocks of cod. Now you have no reason to get this book, as the author does not add much to that sentence - but drags it out. A bunch of relatively unrelated fish facts and boring details of random fish stories - but no storytelling ability is present. Dull and repetitive.
Rating: 4
Summary: Gastronomic History
Comment: Mark Kurlansky's 'fish tale' spans over 400 years of American and world history to reveal how something as seemingly insignificant as one species can alter the course of a country's history. Starting with the Basque fishermen who may have 'discovered' North American before Columbus (but after the Norse), Kurlansky shows how cod became a staple in our diet and affected incidents such as the American Revolution and slavery. He also makes a good case for conservation of the modern Atlantic cod, and present factors that could render this fish for all intents and purposes extinct. From my perspective, the 'cod wars' of the mid-20th century were the most entertaining, and provide a mirror for more well-known historical events such as the Cold War. Sprinkled throughout are recipes -- modern and ancient -- for preparing cod, including snacking on codheads. On the whole, a fascinating look at how war, diplomacy, trade and exploration were fueled by one species, and how we refuse to change our customs, diets, and livelihoods even if we are destructive to our environment and ourselves.
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Title: Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlansky ISBN: 0142001619 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 28 January, 2003 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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Title: The Basque History of the World by Mark Kurlansky ISBN: 0140298517 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: February, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlansky ISBN: 0802713734 Publisher: Walker & Co Pub. Date: January, 2002 List Price(USD): $28.00 |
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Title: The Potato: How the Humble Spud Rescued the Western World by Larry Zuckerman ISBN: 0865475784 Publisher: North Point Press Pub. Date: October, 1999 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: Tobacco: A Cultural History of How an Exotic Plant Seduced Civilization by Iain Gately ISBN: 0802117058 Publisher: Grove Press Pub. Date: 09 January, 2002 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
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