During the 17th and 18th centuries, the potato was berated, feared, and loathed. It was blamed for everything from population explosions to population implosions, not to mention social upheaval and financial despair. Yet now, with the luxury of hindsight, Larry Zuckerman regards the potato as a saving grace for Western civilization, a crop that protected populations from starvation, encouraged self-sufficiency, and improved the lives of ordinary people. The potato's roller-coaster journey from dreary boiled peasant food into the most widely consumed vegetable on the planet is chronicled in this refreshing history lesson. The Potato goes way beyond the usual scope of spud history, which commonly focuses on the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s. Although this disaster is a key event in the book, the potato's broader influence in the Western world was far more complex--changing the shape of agrarian societies, triggering world emigration, and even influencing social-welfare reforms. Snippets from journals, newspaper editorials, and government documents make this a convincing and fascinating glimpse of four centuries' worth of a vegetable to which we normally wouldn't give a second thought. --Naomi Gesinger


Book News, Inc.
Despite Ireland's Great Famine and terms like "couch potato," Seattle writer Zuckerman extols the pivotal role of the "treasure of the Andes" in Western history from the 16th through 20th century. -- Copyright © 1999 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR All rights reserved Book News, Inc.®, Portland, OR


Emily Gordon, Newsday
Thorough and lively . . . Zuckerman is an excellent storyteller


Review
"Throrough and lively....Zuckerman is an excellent storyteller, both conscientious and colloquial....The book stimulates and illuminates."--Emily Gordon, Newsday

"The story of the potato in Western civilization is part of the history of the table, of living conditions, of social attitudes, and even of views of heredity and degeneration. Zuckerman's exploration of these areas without losing his grip on the tuber is masterful, excuted with economy and wit."--Katherine A. Powers, The Boston Sunday Globe



Katherine A. Powers, The Boston Sunday Globe
The story of the potato in Western civilization is part of the history of the table, of living conditions, of social attitudes, and even of views of heredity and degeneration. Zuckerman's exploration of these areas . . . is masterful, executed with economy and wit


Emily Gordon, Newsday
"Thorough and lively . . . Zuckerman is an excellent storyteller, both conscientious and colloquial . . . The book stimulates and illuminates."


Betty Fussell, author of The Story of Corn
"To mash the several-thousand-year history of the potato into a couple hundred pages and to whip that history into lively and engaging prose is a feat worthy of the subject. The potato matters and I'm glad to know why."


Katherine A. Powers, The Boston Sunday Globe
"The story of the potato in Western civilization is part of the history of the table, of living conditions, of social attitudes, and even of views of heredity and degeneration. Zuckerman's exploration of these areas without losing his grip on the tuber is masterful, executed with economy and wit."


Ben Neihart, Baltimore Sun
"Zuckerman . . . knows a frightening great deal about potatoes . . . He knows how the darn things sustained the European population boom and helped along the Industrial revolution . . . [His] exhaustive, fine research pays off big."


Review
"Throrough and lively....Zuckerman is an excellent storyteller, both conscientious and colloquial....The book stimulates and illuminates."--Emily Gordon, Newsday

"The story of the potato in Western civilization is part of the history of the table, of living conditions, of social attitudes, and even of views of heredity and degeneration. Zuckerman's exploration of these areas without losing his grip on the tuber is masterful, excuted with economy and wit."--Katherine A. Powers, The Boston Sunday Globe



Book Description
The Potato tells the story of how a humble vegetable, once regarded as trash food, had as revolutionary an impact on Western history as the railroad or the automobile. Using Ireland, England, France, and the United States as examples, Larry Zuckerman shows how daily life from the 1770s until World War I would have been unrecognizable-perhaps impossible-without the potato, which functioned as fast food, famine insurance, fuel and labor saver, budget stretcher, and bank loan, as well as delicacy. Drawing on personal diaries, contemporaneous newspaper accounts, and other primary sources, this is popular social history at its liveliest and most illuminating.



From the Back Cover
The Potato tells the story of how a humble vegetable, once regarded as trash food, had as revolutionary an impact on Western history as the railroad or the automobile. Using Ireland, England, France, and the United States as examples, Larry Zuckerman shows how daily life from the 1770s until World War I would have been unrecognizable--perhaps impossible--without the potato, which functioned as fast food, famine insurance, fuel and labor saver, budget stretcher, and bank loan, as well as delicacy. Drawing on personal diaries, contemporaneous newspaper accounts, and other primary sources, this is popular social history at its liveliest and most illuminating.


About the Author
Larry Zuckerman is a freelance editor and writer. He lives in Seattle with his wife and young son.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

From the peasants who dug it out of the earth to the scientists who speculated about its aphrodisiac qualities, from the politicians who gerrymandered land rights to the impoverished children whose lives it saved, Larry Zuckerman takes the reader on an engrossing journey through four centuries from the vantage point of the potato. He captures the drama of everyday existence in a world undergoing a dazzling transformation at an urgent pace. Drawing from personal diaries, chronicles, newspaper editorials, government records, and many other original sources, he brings this epic to life, creating both vibrant individual portraits and a panorama of the times.

FROM THE CRITICS

Booknews

Despite Ireland's Great Famine and terms like "couch potato," Seattle writer Zuckerman extols the pivotal role of the "treasure of the Andes" in Western history from the 16th through 20th century. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Johathan Yardley - The Washington Post

Informative . . . To single [the potato] out as the salvation of the world as we know it is . . . not, as this book proves, preposterous.

Emily Gordon - Newsday

Thorough and lively . . . Zuckerman is an excellent storyteller.

Katherine A. Powers - The Boston Sunday Globe