Rum and coke

A History of the World in 6 Glasses - Tom Standage (Walker & Company, 2005)


I remember being positively giddy when this book came out. History? Through an element of pop culture so fundamental I don't think you can even call it pop? Love the idea.

Which of course meant I waited years to actually read it. And also possibly built it up a little too much in my head. How can a popular history possibly live up to such expectations?

The premise: six drinks that both reflected and shaped the world (culturally, economically, politically) in which they were dominant. Six drinks which are still pretty bloody popular today, for that matter. First alcohol, then caffeine. Beer in Mesopotamia and wine in ancient Greece and Rome. Distilled spirits in the colonies. Then coffee comes in from Arabia and helps the growth of the professional clerical class, not to mention Habermas's "transformation of the public sphere." And tea, which looked one way in the Ancient Far East, and quite another once the British got ahold of it. And then Coca Cola, which symbolizes everything about the "triumph" of American capitalism (and our political rhetoric). (Although, if put on the spot, I found myself most interested in how carbonated drinks became popular around the turn of the last century. A world without fizzy water seems almost too terrible to imagine.)

So I wanted more rigorous scholarship. (Not saying the research wasn't vigorous, but I could have gone deeper into it with Standage.) But given the intended audience, this was pretty fun. Recommended.