The Big Oyster A Molluscular History of New York

Mark Kurlansky 지음

Random House 2009년 09월 15일 출간

작품소개

책소개

When Peter Minuit bought Manhattan for $24 in 1626 he showed his shrewdness by also buying the oyster beds off tiny, nearby Oyster Island, renamed Ellis Island in 1770. From the Minuit purchase until pollution finally destroyed the beds in the 1920s, New York was a city known for its oysters, especially in the late 1800s, when Europe and America enjoyed a decades-long oyster craze. In a dubious endorsement, William Makepeace Thackeray said that eating a New York oyster was like eating a baby. Travellers to New York were also keen to experience the famous New York oyster houses. While some were known for their elegance, due to a longstanding belief in the aphrodisiac quality of oysters, they were often associated with prostitution. In 1842, when the novelist Charles Dickens arrived in New York, he could not conceal his eagerness to find and experience the fabled oyster cellars of New York City's slums. The Big Oyster is the story of a city and of an international trade.Filled with cultural, social and culinary insight - as well as recipes, maps, drawings and photographs - this is history at its most engrossing, entertaining and delicious.

출판사 서평

"Kurlansky's great ability is to chose a single element as a prism through which to view the development or degeneration of culture; in this book he takes his readers from the 16th century to the present day, encompassing biology, commerce, the politics of race, history, literature, and, of course, gourmandise"

인물정보

저자(글) Mark Kurlansky

마크 쿨란스키는 음식과 그 역사에 관한 글을 써 온 작가이다. 1997년에 출간된 <대구, 세계를 바꾼 어느 물고기의 역사>는 베스트셀러에 오름과 동시에 뉴욕시립도서관 선정 '1997년 최고의 책'에 선정되기도 했다. 어린이 눈높이에 맞추어 글을 다시 쓰고 뛰어난 그림과 함께 선보인 <대구 이야기-세계 역사를 바꾼 물고기>라는 그림책 역시 뜨거운 호응을 받았다. 성인 교양서로 먼저 발표한 <소금-인류사를 바꾼 하얀 황금의 역사>는 고대부터 현대까지, 중국에서 스칸디나비아반도에 이르기까지 철저한 조사를 거쳐 문화, 역사, 요리, 사회적인 이야기들을 흥미롭게 펼쳐 놓아 큰 호평을 받았다. 이외에도 <바스크의 역사> <음식사변> 등의 책이 있다.