Many separate strands of this compelling story deserve to be pursued further by more focused historians.
A muddy walk through the history of Venice, Lisbon and Amsterdam, whose heydays were all linked to the lucrative spice trade.
Food writer Krondl (Around the American Table: Treasured Recipes and Food Traditions from the American Cookery Collections of the New York Public Library, 1995, etc.) debunks the myth that spices were used over the centuries to mask rancid food. He attempts to understand the demand that prompted Europeans to explore and conquer the world. Spices were a luxury, often used as payment and literally worth their weight in gold. Coming from exotic places few could reach, they represented the aroma and taste of paradise. Fantastic profits could be made in the spice trade. With its strong links to the Byzantine Empire, Venice muscled in on the Mediterranean route, and soon “pepper was the lubricant of trade.” The Crusades spread the taste for spices, but the fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453 effectively sealed the Venetians’ routes. Soon the Portuguese made incursions. King João I sent out looting caravels for West African gold and melegueta pepper; Portuguese explorers braved the seas around the Cape of Good Hope in search of Prester John and Indian black pepper. Vasco da Gama made a momentous advance for the Portuguese by establishing a route from Lisbon to the Spice Islands in the South Pacific. When the Portuguese crown fell to Philip II of Spain in 1580, the prosperous Dutch, inspired by Jan Huyghen van Linschoten’s how-to on the spice trade, took up the slack through the corporate arms of the East India Company. Krondl scrambles and dodges to cover an enormous amount of ground, from spice wars and slavery to disease and the use of spices for medicinal purposes. Trying to do too much, he produces a loose, unscholarly text that many will find difficult to digest.
Many separate strands of this compelling story deserve to be pursued further by more focused historians.Pub Date: Oct. 30, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-345-48083-5
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2007
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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