The Bloodless Revolution: Radical Vegetarians and the Discovery of India

Readers, take note of a few things - Though the author comes up eventually in favor of cutting back on meat products for ecological reasons, it is my impression is not generally sympathetic to vegetarians. The book largely focuses on the hacks and crazies that adopted vegetarianism between 1600-1800. Gandhi gets a scarce few pages. Second, this is A cultural history of vegetarianism, specifically the relationship between western europe and India. His thesis is that India was largely responsible for transplanting many strands of vegetarianism into Europe, specifically England and a few French philosophers. This very well may be true, but a more expansive survey would have made for a more interesting book. I got very bogged down in the first few chapters. All these negatives included, it is a well researched, reasonably well written book on a narrow topic.

C.S. Lewis once delightedly insisted that he couldn't be offered "a mug of tea that was too big or a book that was too long." Being less stalwart than he, my heart sank when I saw the size of the wonderfully named Tristram Stuart's The Bloodless Revolution. But I was quickly captivated by Stuart's enjoyable style, his astounding erudition, the sheer interest of his subject matter, and the exquisite illustrations, in both color and black-and-white. Stuart writes intellectual history in the old-fashioned graceful way of a Basil Wiley, Keith Thomas, or Carolyn Merchant. He excels at showing the cultural, economic, moral, and religious influences from Francis Bacon through the nineteenth century romantic period on attitudes towards a meatless diet. I was especially intrigued to discover that some of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century utilitarians and economists regarded vegetarianism as a means of overcoming the Malthusian disparity between population and resources--a very forward-looking strategy indeed. Stuart's epilogue, in which he discusses the early twentieth-century's "post-Rousseauist" back-to-nature movement that inspired folks as diverse as Gandhi and Hitler, is fascinating. I hope that it serves as the seed for Stuart's next book. All in all, highly recommended for those interested in the history and culture of vegetarianism as well as those interested in modern British intellectual history. For collections of some of the primary sources referred to by Stuart, the reader may wish to consult Ethical Vegetarianism from Pythagoras to Peter Singer and Religious Vegetarianism from Hesiod to the Dalai Lama.

This is one of the most informative and important books that I have ever read. I have worked for a half century in the diet and health research and policy arena and have reluctantly but most assuredly because convinced of the health superiority of a diet comprised of plant-based foods. Along the way I also have become very much aware of the difficulty of communicating this message to the professional and public communities. Although serious interest in this topic is emerging in the last few years, even last few months, I am also aware of a visceral sometimes very hostile reaction against this view from a relatively small but sometimes influential group of people. The gap between the believers and non-believers in this way of eating could hardly be more contentious. Thus I have frequently wondered about the question of whatever happened to rational, civil discourse on a topic such as this, especially at a time when we are getting so much empirical data to support the use of a plant-based diet and so much demand for health care solutions. This book comes as close as any to providing the explanation that I have sought. Although I am not a professional historian or philosopher, I have long had an avid interest in these disciplines. I strongly believe in that age-old adage that those who ignore history are bound to repeat it. However limited my perspective may be, I nonetheless find this book by Tristram Stuart to be an incredible presentation of some events and ideas that really go a long way to help provide an answer to my question. I am still awed by the depth and sophistication of knowledge that existed among leading scholars and medical people in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries concerning the use of a plant-based diet. I am sure that it is possible to quibble about Stuart's selection and interpretation of references, as is true of almost any historical account. Nonetheless, I am impressed with these references, not only because of their number, but also because of Stuart's liberal use of direct quotations--these can be easily confirmed, if necessary. But, more to the point, I found that so many of the views of these early writers, who had limited access to empirical data, to be remarkably well confirmed with the highly technical findings gathered in recent years. With my son, Tom, we write about these findings in our own book, "The China Study. Startling Implications of Diet, Weight Loss and Long-Term Health". There are many other impressive and largely unknown findings told in this book. I especially enjoyed the views on diet and health of these writers that were at the core of philosophical discussions that were to shape Renaissance thinking, especially on matters that led to political reform. I highly recommend this book--it is full of enormously impressive content that says so much about what we are now experiencing in this field. Tristram Stuart is a remarkably capable young writer and I very much hope that he will continue writi