Tobacco: A Cultural History of How an Exotic Plant Seduced Civilization

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Description

Tobacco was first cultivated and enjoyed by the indigenous inhabitants of the Americas, who used it for medicinal, religious, and social purposes long before the arrival of Columbus. But when Europeans began to colonize the American continents, it became something else entirely — a cultural touchstone of pleasure and success, and a coveted commodity that would develop into the world economy endlessly. Iain Gately’s Tobacco tells the epic story of an strange plant and its unique relationship with the history of humanity, from its obscure ancient beginnings, through its rise to global prominence, to its current embattled state today. In a full of life narrative, Gately makes the case for the tobacco trade being the driving force at the back of the growth of the American colonies, the foundation of Dutch trading empire, the underpinning cause of the African slave trade, and the financial basis for our victory in the American Revolution. Informed and erudite, Tobacco is a vivid and provocative look into the complex history of this precious plant. “A rich, complex history … Deeply engaging and witty.” — Carmela Ciuraru, Los Angeles Times “Ambitious … informative and perceptive … Gately is an amusing author, which is a blessing.” — Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post “[Gately] documents the resourcefulness with which human beings of every class, religion, race, and continent have pursued the lethal leaf.” — John Leland, The New York Times Book Review

Iain Gately’s Tobacco is a sweeping cultural history of the world’s most prevalent addiction, and it’s probably the best book ever written on its subject. Gately begins in pre-Columbian America, where the natives made tobacco “their most popular gift to the rest of humanity,” and continues through all the cantankerous smoking litigation of the 1990s. The story touches on just about every subject conceivable: tobacco in literature, the movies, and society. It would be wrong to call Gately an advocate of smoking, but he clearly takes pleasure, for example, in noting that Hitler’s Nazis launched one of history’s most vigorous anti-smoking initiatives. The book is full of delicious trivia: Many of Shakespeare’s contemporaries smoked, but there is no evidence that the Bard himself did, and none of his plays make any mention of smoking; he “kept his writing a smoke-free zone.” On the other hand, reports Gately with a smirk, there is “archaeological evidence proving that smoking was going on around the Shakespeare household in Stratford-upon-Avon all the way through his life.” Smoking aficionados won’t want to miss Tobacco, and it’s a much healthier gift for them than a box of cigars. –John Miller

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