The Basque History of the World, Mark Kurlansky
The Basque History of the World, Mark Kurlansky
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The Basque History of the World

Author: Mark Kurlansky

Narrator: George Guidall

Unabridged: 12 hr 43 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 04/22/2011

Synopsis

Award-winning author Mark Kurlansky has drawn enthusiastic praise for his books, which are sharply-focused studies as well as glorious celebrations of their subjects. In The Basque History of the World, he turns his eye toward Europe's oldest surviving culture-a culture as mysterious as it is fascinating. Settled in the western Pyrenees Mountains of France and Spain, the Basque nation is not drawn on maps and the origin of their forbidden language has never been discovered. Yet, Basques appear to predate all other cultures in Europe, with many significant global contributions to their credit. Most notably, one of their own took command after Magellan's death and was the first person to circumnavigate the globe. This informative book is full of lively anecdotes that illuminate an otherwise obscure culture. Narrator George Guidall rises to the challenge of the text, which includes many Basque terms, and interprets beautifully.

About Mark Kurlansky

Mark Kurlansky is the New York Times bestselling and James A. Beard Award–winning author of 1968: The Year That Rocked the World; Salt: A World History; The Basque History of the World; Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World; The White Man in the Tree (a collection of short stories); and several other books. Boogaloo on Second Avenue is his first novel. He lives in New York City.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Jennifer on June 13, 2013

I wanted to like this better, but one key missing element kept nagging at me the entire time I was reading: where are the women? You'd think that the deciding factor in defining Basque culture is having a penis. Seriously, there are a couple of asides about the role women have played in preserving B......more

Goodreads review by Bob on August 14, 2024

An Enjoyable Grab-bag of Events, Recipes and Trivia In my search for a better understanding of the Basques, their place in European history and the reasons for the continuing conflict in their region today, I picked up Mark Kurlansky's book. THE BASQUE HISTORY OF THE WORLD is extremely well-written i......more

Goodreads review by Ciara on November 21, 2008

mark kurlanksy has a real gift for taking a potentially great subject & running it into the ground with his painful writing style. he's a classic pop historian, more interested in writing about himself & what a totally awesome dude he is than the subject his book is supposed to be addressing...or he......more

Goodreads review by Adam on January 15, 2023

Weird that I've never paid much attention to the Basques given that they show up in a lot of topics I'm interested in, such as: The Song of Roland, The Spanish Civil War, niche national liberation struggles, gladio-type conspiracies, pre-Confederation Canadian history, and the Newfoundland cod fishe......more

Goodreads review by Tuck on July 25, 2012

one of my favorite books i have read many times, you can dip in and out wherever and just as satisfying sampling as reading cover to cover. kurlansky has a penchant for writing about history from one point and letting all of humankind swirl around that point in time and space. he did it with cod fis......more

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