Inventing Wine: A New History of One of the World's Most Ancient Pleasures
Author(s): Paul Lukacs
Wine is around 8,000 years old but the wines that people buy and drink today are mostly quite new. Modern wine exists as the product of multiple revolutions - scientific, industrial, social, even ideological. Though it has the same basic chemical substance as its ancient forebear, it is in every other respect very different. For many thousands of years, wine was a basic need. Contemporary wines taste unlike those from earlier eras and are valued in novel ways. Today it is a cultural choice and the reasons why millions of people choose it tells us as much about them as about the contents of the bottle or glass. In Inventing Wine, Paul Lukacs chronicles wine's transformation from a source of sustenance to a consciously pursued pleasure, in the process offering a new way to view the present as well as the past.
Product Information
Thoughtful and provocative, this book shows that the history of wine is as complex as the history of human society. --Esther Mobley "Paul Lukacs's research is methodical, his content thorough and his prose vivid...There are...original ideas here, which place the history of wine in a fascinating social and cultural context of interest for connoisseur and general reader alike." Times Literary Supplement "... thoughtful history..." The Independent "...entertaining, offbeat history of wine...a fascinating antidote to many romantic notions that have grown up around wine..." Decanter "... a wonderful new book on the history of wine." www.quentinsadler.wordpress.com
A professor of English at Loyola University Maryland, Paul Lukacs is the author of The Great Wines of America and American Vintage, and the recipient of the James Beard, IACP and Clicquot Book of the Year awards. Author website: www.inventingwine.com
General Fields
- :
- : WW Norton & Co
- : WW Norton & Co
- : 0.31
- : 30 September 2013
- : 210mm X 140mm
- : United States
- : 01 December 2013
- : books
Special Fields
- : Paul Lukacs
- : Paperback
- : 641.22
- : 384
- : black & white illustrations