Gin took London by storm in the first half of the 18th century. It "was the original urban drug," says Warner in this intriguing slice of social history. "Cheap, potent, and readily available," it aided London's poor in escaping the wretchedness of their lives and was considered a public menace by Daniel Defoe and Samuel Johnson. (Hogarth's famous print Gin Lane
imagined a nightmarish world destroyed by a seemingly demonic drink.) Warner, a University of Toronto professor, gives us the whole story of gin: where it came from (Holland), who drank it (a large percentage were women), how it was perceived among elites (as a threat to the nation), and how legislative efforts to curb consumption fared (badly). Due to its popularity among the English lower classes, gin became synonymous with squalor. And as back-alley gin-shops doubled as meeting places for thieves, gin also became associated with debauchery and criminality. Warner brings us inside these rundown, unlicensed gin shops to show us how and where gin was consumed. and into Parliament, which in 1736 passed the "most notorious" of a series of Gin Acts, which ended in failure. Gin consumption increased; moreover, the laws created a working-class atmosphere of "open contempt for the law and its agents." In the book's final chapter, Warner paints an interesting parallel between the "gin craze" and the recent war on drugs. This informative and accessible popular history should appeal to those with a taste for 18th-century English history as well to those interested in histories of mind-altering substances, such as Dominic Streatfeild's recent Cocaine: An Unauthorized Biography, Richard Davenport-Hines's The Pursuit of Oblivion
and the forthcoming Out of It: A Cultural History of Intoxication
by Stuart Walton (Forecasts, July 29). Illus. (Oct. 21)
