The Extraordinary Story of the World's Favorite Drink
Overview:
Having managed a tea plantation that stretched over 500 acres in Africa, Roy Moxham went from a tea-newbie, to a man fascinated by the plant which is drank by 2 billion people every morning. His book 'A Brief History of Tea' explores how tea grew from a beverage enjoyed by the elites, to one consumer daily by the masses, and how British businessmen drove investments across multiple continents in order to tap into the tea opportunity. Travelling across China, India, Sri Lanka and the African continent, the book takes you on a whirlwind history across the key events and features of tea production, and shows how the world's favorite drink has an often unhappy past.
I had a vague idea about the role of tea in history, but hadn't realized the extent to which it played a role in a number of events worldwide, the the crime and violence that has been associated with the drink!
Some things that stood out to be during the book:
That in the early-1700s high tea taxes drove tea smuggling into the forefront of the tea trade, with more tea entering the UK illegally then legally. There are obviously no figures to show how much tea entered the UK illegally, but in the 10 years before the tax reduction, only 54.5 million lbs were legally brought into the UK, compared to 228.9 million in the 10 years after!
That the first teas to Britain were green teas rather than the blacks teas usually drunk today
The Boston Tea Party incident was a result of the high taxes on tea
The Opium wars in China were the result of a trade dispute, with the British selling Opium to fuel its tea purchases
Camellia sinensis assamica - the tea that is native to Assam in India, was initially not thought to be a tea plant!
That the Indian tea trade, and in particular in Assam, was very cruel, with an estimated 35,000 workers dying on the Assam estates between 1863 and 1866!
Ethnic tensions in Sri Lanka were partly a result of large number of Indian Tamils travelling to Sri Lanka to work on the tea plantations and settling there
With the collapse of the British Empire in Asia, businesses looked for new locations to plant tea, which is why Kenya became such a key place for tea growth
That tea bags are such a new invention - and that as late as the 1970's only 10% of tea in the UK was drunk from tea bags
Okay, this is a very short selection of the history of tea, but you will have to read it yourself to find out more!
Overall, this was an enjoyable book to read. It is well written and examines the history of tea in several key locations, looking at how tea grew from small operations to large plantations and how it has driven and been a part of a network of international trade for centuries.
However, this book is by no means a comprehensive history of tea! Moxham has focused on the British experience of tea - and its growth from an oddity to an obsession, and the role of the East India Company in particular in bringing tea to the West. This isn't necessarily a bad thing as it gives a great overview of where tea has been grown, the ups and downs of the industry in different nations and the aggressive tactics of the East India Company and British Empire in securing the economic advantages of tea. But it does mean that there are many sides of tea history which are not covered.
Synopsis:
The dark history that brought us a nice cup of tea.
Behind the wholesome image of the world's most popular drink lies a strangely murky and often violent past. When tea began to be imported into the West from China in the seventeenth century, its high price and heavy taxes made it an immediate target for smuggling and dispute at every level, culminating in international incidents like the notorious Boston Tea Party. In China itself, the British financed their tea dealings by the ruthless imposition of the opium trade. Intrepid British tea planters soon began flocking to Africa, India and Ceylon, setting up huge plantations. Workers could be brought and sold like slaves.
Roy Moxham begins with this own sojourn in Africa, managing 500 acres of tea and a thousand=strong workforce. His experiences inform the book and lead him to investigate the early history of tea - his research often reflects little credit on the British Empire, while revealing a fascinating word story.
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