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The Bloodless Revolution: A Cultural History of Vegetarianism from 1600 to Modern Times Hardcover – January 17, 2007
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How Western Christianity and Eastern philosophy merged to spawn a political movement that had the prohibition of meat at its core.
The Bloodless Revolution is a pioneering history of puritanical revolutionaries, European Hinduphiles, and visionary scientists who embraced radical ideas from the East and conspired to overthrow Western society's voracious hunger for meat. At the heart of this compelling history are the stories of John Zephaniah Holwell, survivor of the Black Hole of Calcutta, and John Stewart and John Oswald, who traveled to India in the eighteenth century, converted to the animal-friendly tenets of Hinduism, and returned to Europe to spread the word. Leading figures of the Enlightenmentamong them Rousseau, Voltaire, and Benjamin Franklingave intellectual backing to the vegetarians, sowing the seeds for everything from Victorian soup kitchens to contemporary animal rights and environmentalism.Spanning across three centuries with reverberations to our current world, The Bloodless Revolution is a stunning debut from a young historian with enormous talent and promise. 24 pages of color illustrations
- Print length656 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherW. W. Norton & Company
- Publication dateJanuary 17, 2007
- Dimensions6.7 x 1.7 x 9.6 inches
- ISBN-100393052206
- ISBN-13978-0393052206
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From The Washington Post
Why do some cultures ban eating perfectly digestible, healthful and nutritious foods? In the realm of food anthropology, no subject is more mysterious and fascinating than that of food taboos, and no taboo is more fascinating than the one against meat that shows up around the world in diverse societies.
Tristram Stuart's thought-provoking book is not a global history of this taboo. Instead, it revolves around the vegetarian movement that began in 17th-century England -- the name first came into use in the 1840s -- and that remains strong today. But there is nothing narrow about the author's focus. Both scholarly and entertaining, The Bloodless Revolution is a huge feast of ideas -- ideas from India and France and America, from ancient Greece and Thoreau and Emerson, from Rousseau, Hobbes, the Kabbalah, the Old Testament, Descartes and Darwin, to name just a few of the better-known sources that weigh in on the meatless diet.
Vegetarianism illustrates the tremendous impact that India had on British culture but also the impact of the British on India. Mahatma Gandhi, Stuart tells us, didn't take up vegetarianism as a cause until he encountered the raw food movement, which dates back to the poet Shelley, while in London to study law. Gandhi embraced the diet -- he had rejected vegetarianism in his youth -- because he determined it was free of "himsa" or violence.
But the meatless diet couldn't be completely violence-free, for it also appealed to Adolf Hitler. Stuart points out that not only was Hitler a vegetarian but so were Himmler, Hess, Bormann and possibly Goebbels. They even argued about the purity of each others' diets, with Hess declining to eat meals cooked by Hitler's chef because the vegetables were not truly organic.
And these were not the only violent vegetarians. In the late 18th century, John Oswald advocated armed revolution in Britain while maintaining a vegetarian diet, convinced by his years in India that all killing was wrong. Therefore, he thought, killers must be killed. Although this sounds slightly mad, the same argument is frequently accepted as logic for capital punishment.
Fascinating as the array of moral, religious, philosophical, environmental and biological arguments in favor of vegetarianism is, the arguments against it are far more intriguing than even an inveterate meat-eater would imagine. For one thing, people long believed that life simply could not be sustained without meat. In 1654, the untimely death of Robert Norwood, an outspoken proponent of what today would be called a vegan diet, was widely believed to have been caused by malnutrition.
But do the animals that provide the meat that sustains life have souls, feelings? Could they be killed without remorse? Those questions long swirled around vegetarianism. Descartes, an advocate of vegetarianism for health reasons, nevertheless insisted that animals were incapable of thought or emotions. Even among those who otherwise admired Cartesian thinking, many took great offense at the suggestion that their cats and dogs were unfeeling beasts. In fact, as a reaction to Descartes, many philosophers started asserting that animals did have thoughts and feelings and therefore should not be consumed.
But we have to eat something. Today, many people accord feelings, emotions and thoughts to animals, but that has not stopped most of us from eating them. Even if we someday discovered that vegetables also have feelings, we would not starve ourselves because of it. In Hinduism, it is said that a true saint would live on nothing but air and that humans are incapable of such perfection.
Copyright 2007, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.
Product details
- Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company; First Edition (January 17, 2007)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 656 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0393052206
- ISBN-13 : 978-0393052206
- Item Weight : 2.4 pounds
- Dimensions : 6.7 x 1.7 x 9.6 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #1,970,726 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,478 in Vegetarian Cooking
- #26,970 in Sociology (Books)
- #53,943 in Philosophy (Books)
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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 writing more such material!
In the meanwhile, we now desperately need some of the courage and creativity of these early writers--a revolution in health could hardly be more needed. Thank you, Tristram Stuart, for sharing your thoughts.
Top reviews from other countries
Although a little like a history text book in places, the book is well researched and is quite academic in nature.

