For a non-fiction laugh, A Short History of Drunkenness will take readers through alcohol enjoyment, use, and overuse in different civilizations throughout the world. Connect with drinkers from all walks of life, or laugh at various drinking customs from history in this readable, hilarious drunken history.

Amusing and fascinating book. Unfortunately the outlet to which I'd pitched coverage of this title opted not to take it.

A fun, surprisingly not dry, look at the history of drunkenness! Forsyth gives us a great peek into alcohol's place in our evolving societies.

Many thanks go to Mark Forsyth, Three Rivers, and Netgalley for the free copy of this book in exchange for my unbiased review. Short book read it overnight. Really entertaining author has a great sense of humor. This is not a thorough investigation, rather more a historical overview of noted periods of importance. Starts in early reaches of BC and ends with Prohibition, which according to Forsyth is the epitome of America’s stupidity. I didn’t like being called stupid. He sounded a bit petulant in that chapter. But I’m glad I have added this book to my alcoholic beverage collection. Very informative Full of fun facts not a dull moment

This book was so interesting. I learned so much about the history of alcohol and the impact it has had on society. Definitely a unique and informative read!

A shallow but funny history of humanity's relationship with booze. Brief chapters cover pretty much every historical era you'd expect: Egypt, Mesopotamia, the Greeks, the Romans, the Bible, Ancient China, Vikings, the Medieval Middle East, Medieval England, the Aztecs, colonial Australia, the Wild West, Russia, American Prohibition, and London's Gin Craze of the 1700s. That's quite the list for a book of less than three hundred pages, and indeed Forsyth is clearly focused on being amusing and easy to read more than he is on deep historical investigations – which isn't really a critique, as long as "silly and quick" is what you're looking for. (I am a bit skeptical of some of his claims, but he has footnotes to back him up; I suspect it's a case of Forsyth taking the most extreme possible side in genuine historical debates.)

It's a nice collection of "hey, did-you-know" trivia, but I doubt anyone will come away with more insight on the history of alcohol than they started with.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2359439295

4.5 stars. An uproariously amusing, well-written book that delivers exactly what its title proclaims. I couldn't put it down. My only quibbles are that some sections delve deeper than others, with the more modern bits somehow rendered less interesting than the parts about ancient cultures, and that even with extensive references listed in the back, it seems hard to know how much of what Forsyth claims is fact, and how much might be made up for effect. A few "real" footnotes, in addition to the just plain funny ones here, would have been welcome.

From early homo sapiens getting toasty on rotting fruit to the invention of porridge-like chunky ale to Viking's imbibing in mead halls to Prohibition flappers drinking themselves blind on bathtub brewed rotgut, Mark Forsyth's excellent tongue-in-cheek guide to the human history of getting sloshed is a delight. I found reading about the ways different cultures viewed and treated drunkenness throughout the years to be fascinating and I also learned that I don't have the fortitude to be Russian, where the average man still consumes a half bottle of vodka a day. "A Short History of Drunkenness" is a great read for those who enjoy approachable, humorous history centered around a unifying theme; goes great with a pint in hand!

An exploration of drinking customs among various societies around the world throughout history.

The author writes as if, well, he's had one too many at times. The style is conversational, abrupt, a bit crass, and sometimes foul. At times, detail gets overlooked; at other times, we get plenty of detail. The overgeneralizations at times are a bit stunning...and might concern many readers, for if these historical bits are getting treated casually, how much confidence can there be in what is described in detail?

In terms of what I can speak toward in terms of specialty, in terms of the Bible, the section was not terrible; the point about shekar not being beer is highly contestible, since shekar is mentioned frequently in the OT, we've found plenty of breweries in archaeological expeditions, which makes sense, considering the associations with Egypt...and in his source area it seems Alter is his only recent source, which makes the whole thing seem a bit suspect.

Based on that, I'd take many of the claims with a grain of salt. One does get a picture of the prevalence of drink and what it has meant in various societies, even if one does not sign on to the author's attempt to justify its prevalence as inevitability.

Touching on when, why, and where humanity has engaged in or tried to reject drunkenness, Forsyth has written a witty, highly interesting, quick read that contains lots of information packed into a short history. I didn't want to put it down, nor did I want it to end. This short history lacks the traditional citations found in history books, but the chapter by chapter bibliography Forsyth includes at the end lends itself well to a reader that wants to delve further into humanity's obsession with alcohol.

Excellent, fun history of alcohol

I loved this book. It has history, some science, lots and lots of stories about drinking, and some etymology. The history was my favorite part; everything else was a bonus. Mark Forsyth has a great sense of humor that comes through in the book and he writes in a very conversational manner. Even the footnotes are great and worth reading. I look forward to reading more of Forsyth’s books.
Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book for review purposes via Netgalley.

If I could add one word to the title of Mark Forsyth’s book “A Short History of Drunkenness: How, Why, Where, and When Humankind Has Gotten Merry from the Stone Age to the Present,” I would include the word funny so it’d read “A Short Funny History of Drunkenness: How, Why, Where, and When Humankind Has Gotten Merry from the Stone Age to Prohibition.”

Not that there aren’t sad things in the book. (Englishwoman Judith Defour strangled her two-year-old baby and sold the baby’s clothing to feed her gin addiction.) But for the most part, “A Short History of Drunkenness” doesn’t dwell on the sad things — like how alcohol should include a warning label for “could cause death.”

It’s introduction — “I’m afraid that I don’t really know what drunkenness is” — made me chuckle. “That may seem an odd confession for a fellow who’s about to write a history of drunkenness,” Forsyth writes, “but, to be honest, if authors were to let a trifling thing like ignorance stop them from writing, the bookshops would be empty.”

So how can someone not be able to define drunkenness? Forsyth, who admits he “drinks an awful lot more than most,” describes it like seeing the Silence from “Doctor Who” — those aliens you instantly forget about if you don’t see them — in that “If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks, I do not know.”

“Certainly, if an alien knocked on my door and asked why people across this peculiar planet keep drinking alcohol, I wouldn’t answer, ‘Oh, that’s just to impair our reflexes. It’s basically to stop us getting too good at ping-pong,'” he writes.

So Forsyth’s “The Short History of Drunkenness” is his attempt to explain something that “will never and can never be precisely recalled.”

Forsyth’s thesis: most religions and cultures can be interpreted through their relationship to alcohol. Alcohol was the very reason people worked (from Ancient Egypt to Australia) and cultures (from Greece to Russia) designed rituals around required binge-drinking. “In 9,000 B.C., we invented farming because we wanted to get drunk on a regular basis,” “Very primitive writing was really just a bunch of IOUS,” and “The Pilgrim Fathers weren’t meant to land at Plymouth Rock, but the Mayflower had run out of beer. So they had to stop there,” writes Forsyth.

People devoted themselves to gods of drunkenness (think Ninkasi, Hathor, Dionysus, Bacchus or Odin) and men who controlled the intake and distribution of alcohol wielded the power (George Washington exchanged free booze for votes). Even monotheistic religions like Christianity “saw wine as a Good Thing,” with the gospels pointing to Jesus’ reputation as a “drunkard.” And since Christianity required wine for the ritual of communion, “wherever Christianity has spread, the Christians have had to take vines with them.”

Alcohol even had a role in the afterlife. Ancient Egyptians were buried with jugs of imported wine, Chinese cultures used alcohol to talk to the dead and faithful Muslims and Vikings are promised eternities full of wine or mead in heaven or Valhalla.

But the most amusing explanation for why humans drink might be the most primitive, or what Forsyth calls the “Drunken Money Hypothesis”: “We evolved to drink.”

Disclaimer: I received a free eARC of “A Short History of Drunkenness: How, Why, Where, and When Humankind Has Gotten Merry from the Stone Age to the Present” by Mark Forsyth from NetGalley in exchange for this honest review.

I like to drink. I also like to read, and if said book isn’t a gigantic tome, I’m more than willing to give it a try. When I came across Mark Forsyth’s 2017 “history book,” A Short History of Drunkenness, I had to make an attempt to read it. At less than 300 pages, it’s the perfect length for me to squeeze into a week. In the beginning, I wasn’t sure if I’d like it. Turns out I did and enjoyed it a good deal. While not a top rated, top shelf favorite, not everything can be. However, I’ll put it on the next shelf down, a most respectable position.
If you want a cut and dry as toast history book written by a historian, you’ll need to look elsewhere. Forsyth admits from the outset he’s not a historian, and this history isn’t a history book on the history of drinking. His subject is drunkenness, and he tries to distinguish one from the other. I’d say he succeeds without getting sidetracked or hung up on trivial details.
A Short History of Drunkenness doesn’t read like a history book. Those books I say read like a good History Channel documentary, yeah, not this one. Forsyth’s English, and interjects a lot of humor, dare I say “cheekiness” into the drunkenness. Instead of the History Channel, what we have here is more Monty Python to an extent. The good, not the silly absurd.
A Short History of Drunkenness covers many cultures, each chapter dedicated to one and there’s no jumping back and forth between them. Its easy to follow, easy to understand, and easy to read. At times the euphemisms for “drunk” can get a bit tiresome. The same goes for “sex.” That’s the lone complaint I have, and it’s not that grating.
With St. Patrick’s Day coming up, A Short History of Drunkenness is a good book to get into the spirit. I do find it odd there’s nothing about the Irish, but I’ll chalk the omission up to an English bias.
*I received this as an uncorrected eBook galley from netgalley.com in exchange for this honest review.

Copyright © Drew Martin 2018

This is a short but well written general history. At times, it might be too general but too much detail would have taken away from the focus, flow and humour. I really enjoyed it and suspect anyone who has read A History of the World in 6 Glasses or Shakespear’s Pub will as well. Thank you for the opportunity to read an advanced copy in return for an honest review.