A history of the world in 6 glasses sparknotes
A History of the World in 6 Glasses.
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Tom Standage’s A History of the World in 6 Glasses gives a light, high-level history of six beverages that all had an impact on human history or development. I’m a big fan of four of them – beer, distilled spirits, coffee, and tea – and won’t turn down the fifth, wine. Only the last of the six Standage covers, Coca-Cola, seems out of place, both based on my personal tastes (I’ll only drink it if I have a headache and can’t have more coffee) and on its status as a thoroughly artifical beverage protected by trade secrets.
Standage has to stretch on occasion to construct some of his historical connections, but in general he’s treading on safe ground, especially with beer and liquor, because their development or discovery had substantial economic impacts on the societies that consumed them. Beer was originally both a natural byproduct of grain storage and a safer alternative to water in an era when bacterial contamination was not understood; liquor, notably rum, drove international trade routes, agricultural production in the Caribbean and Latin America, and the slave trade with nativ
A History of the World in 6 Glasses Summary
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How Your Favorite Drinks Changed the World
Whether you’re drinking wine or beer, or select non-alcoholic beverages such as coffee and Coca-Cola, chances are you’ve never spent even a minute to reflect on how they got to your table. Tom Standage has spent few years of his life.
His conclusions?
That, in fact, you can tell the history of our world by telling the history of six of our favorite drinks. In this manner, “A History of the World in 6 Glasses” is a unique book. It doesn’t really talk about wars and revolutions – and yet, it talks about changes.
Drinks caused important global events. Did you know that? Would you long to learn it?
Learn it with us – in about a thousand words!
Who Should Read “A History of the World in 6 Glasses”? And Why?
There are three answers to these questions.
The first one is a bit obvious. If you are a beer enthusiast, a wine connoisseur, coffee addict, tea fanatic, spirits fan, or a Coca-Cola girlfriend – you’ll certainly want to read this book. Or at least two chapters of it, concerning the beverage of your choice.
The second answer is less apparent but as spot on: historian
A History of the World in 6 Glasses Summary and Review
About one century later, another groundbreaking drink emerged, this time in the United States: soda.
The British scientist and clergyman Joseph Priestley was the first to devise carbonized soda, after he discovered the process of dissolving gas into water.
People initially used Priestley’s carbonated drink for medicinal purposes, as it was similar to natural spring water. In the United States, however, people started drinking it for its taste.
Soda soon became widely regarded as a refreshing drink, and its popularity grew even more after the introduction of the bottling process, developed in 1805 by Benjamin Silliman, a chemistry professor at Yale University. And in 1909, a bottled soda seller named Joseph Hawkins figured out how to use fountains to dispense soda directly to customers.
Americans also improved the taste of soda by adding syrups made from fruits to the refreshment. And one American soon came up with the most notable soda of them all: Coca-Cola.
John Pemberton, a pharmacist from the state of Georgia, invented Coca-Cola by experimenting with coca, an ingredient he’d read about in medical journals. He created a
A History of the World in 6 Glasses Summary & Examine Guide
“A History of the Earth in Six Glasses” by Tom Standage is a non-fiction serve that traces the history of the six most important drinks that mankind discovered, developed and enjoyed throughout known history. These drinks often came at crucial times in history or heralded in new eras and became symbols of the times or beliefs and emotions of the nations that they impacted.
Fifty-thousand years ago, hunter/gatherers lived nomadic lifestyles migrating to locations where they could hunt their prey and gather their fruit and nuts. A shift occurred about 12,000 years ago toward farming. Why this change occurred is not clear but it caused the tribes to forsake their nomadic lifestyles in favor of a settled and stationary existence. Once they stayed in one place, they discovered some unusual qualities about the grains they grew. Grains became sweet when soaked in water and when left exposed, they developed a fizzy, intoxicating quality. The farmers developed a pleasing liquid from their grains that they added to their soups and stews. Over time, the farmers drank the liquid instead of adding it to their soup. They had developed
A History of the World in 6 Glasses
"A History of the World in 6 Glasses is loaded with the kind of data that get talked about at the figurative water cooler . . . Incisive, illuminating and swift."—Janet Maslin, The New York Times
"[Standage] uses something mundane and everyday to tell vivid and accessible stories about the changing textures of human life."—Steven Shapin, The New Yorker
"As refreshing as a cool glass of beer on a hot day and as stimulating as that first cup of coffee in the morning. There aren't many books this entertaining that also provide a cogent crash course in ancient, classical and modern history."—Wendy Smith, Los Angeles Times
"Historians, understandably, devote most of their attention to war, politics and, not least, money. But history can also be seen through the prism of the commodities that money buys. In A History of the World in Six Glasses, Tom Standage argues that beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea and cola have each, in their own way, helped to shape the course of history."—Matthew Rees, The Wall Street Journal
"When Standage decided to follow his readable study of an 18th-century chess-playing au