The Story of Corn

by Betty Fussell and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Book Overview

The Story of Corn is a unique compendium, drawing upon history and mythology, science and art, anecdote and image, personal narrative and epic to tell the extraordinary story of the grain that built the New World. Corn transformed the way the entire world eats, providing a hardy, inexpensive alternative to rice or wheat and cheap fodder for livestock and finding its way into everything from explosives to embalming fluid.

Betty Fussell...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0826335926
• ISBN13: 9780826335920
• Release Date: December 2004
• Publisher: University of New Mexico Press
• Length: 367 Pages
• Weight: 1.74 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 8.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Story of Corn

This book fulfilled all my expectations. Excellent, thorough history of corn. Delivery was expeditious and condition of book was excellent.

Kind of A-maize-ing

I must admit, I am actually a beet person (well, root vegetables generally) and bought this book to get ammo to goof on my corn enthusiast friends. But how the worm has turned! Corn and human history are inextricably linked, a bonding of nurture and social evolution. This book lays down the facts. I guess in retrospect my "hubris" about beets was misguided and wrong. I now think the lesson I learned, whether it pertains to vegetables, politics, music or whatever, is that YOU SHOULD NEVER UNDERESTIMATE DIFFERENT OPINIONS. It's too easy to do, and is an easy way to miss out on fundamental truths. In that sense, this book transcends it's core audience of corn folk (cornies?) and teaches a much deeper lesson if you are not really interested in corn - that well disciplined research into unfamiliar topics can instruct and delight the receptive reader. Read it, enjoy and reflect.

Best book about corn you can find!

I love corn. Whether it's cobbed, creamed, breaded, or popped. This book is non-stop corn!

A specialized food history

Food historian Betty Fussell's survey of corn history blends folklore, anthropology, botany and social and art history to provide a lively blend of anecdotes and facts about world corn, from its influence on war and ritual uses in the Inca and Aztec worlds to its use as a key ingredient in different cultures' cuisines. The Story Of Corn isn't a cookbook; it's a specialized food history which will appeal across many different lines, from students of anthropology and sociology to culinary enthusiasts and history buffs.

A persuasive treatise on a pervasive food...

A fun, crammed compendium on how this food became ubiquitous--like the apple in our diet. It's forms and functions are seemingly unending. You'll be surprised how much and in what ways you've consumed it. Stock photos, quotes, recipes, postcards: a loving scrapbook and historical tale of corn. If you're a cook, you'll love it. It's like a year of Gourmet magazine with every issue on a different facet of corn. A fun gift to give.