Rating: 
Summary: Above right and wrong: A superficial manifesto
Review: Mr Kurlansky tries to convince us that despite the brutality in their means, there is an historical reason for Basques to fight their enemies: Spain and France. No need to say that he uses the term Basque when he should have written Basque nationalists, a mistake that many nationalist people would not even notice. Unhappily, this way of thinking is very common among intellectuals who are keen on being above right and wrong: "they are certainly brutal, but there must be a reason for what they are doing. Otherwise, they would not do it. Let us investigate". And the author did so superficially and, apparently, he only listened to people who told him what he wanted to hear, feeding his hunger for a romantic fight to be part of. At the end, the way the author writes our history, the fact that some crucial moments in recent history are simply ignored, the absence of non-nationalistic points of view and the lack of discussion make the book to be poor to me. Just to give an example,the most disgracful episodes in the Spanish democracy (GAL and another dirty state wars) are given the right treatment. On the contrary, fueling paranoiod thoughts, words like Hipercor, Gesto por la Paz, Bakea Orain, Miguel Angel Blanco, Yoyes, Ortega Lara or Julio Iglesias Zamora are not even mentioned. None Basque non-nationalist intellectuals such as Patxo Unzueta, Jon Juaristi, Fernando Savater, Agustin Ibarrola are mentioned or quoted whatsoever. Even Txillida is regarded as nationalist just because he designed the logo for Gestoras pro amnistia! He should have asked Txillida about this. What can you expect when, at the very beginning of the book, the author says that "Basque Country is too green to be Spain and to rough to be France". I call this ignorance, dangerous ignorance. As a Basque, broght up in Basque schools, and as a leftist progressive man that I am (calm down, I am not a PSOE suppoter at all: I dislike the third ways), this book is an absolute disgraceful nonsense.
Rating: 
Summary: Kurlansky the Great
Review: 'Basque' is a well written book and a pleasure to read. I enjoyed Kurlansky's last book 'Cod' slightly more but I found it interesting to learn about the Basques who have been much maligned thru history. They deserve so much more appreciation.
Rating: 
Summary: A Basque History Of The World
Review: I found the book to be a terrible disappointment. It turned out to be more of a polical manifesto than a serious, documented book on the history and culture of the Basque people and their wonderful country. I found it to be very superficial and extremely biased on its discussion of the historical relationship of the Basques with the rest of the Spanish peoples, past and present. I can only think of two redeeming qualities. It contains a wonderful collection of traditional Basque cooking recipies and it is one of the very few books written in English that one is likely to come across. Read it but keep an open mind.
Rating: 
Summary: Basque history through Basque eyes
Review: It is a rare ocasion when a foreigner sees the Basques or their history without being condicioned by French or Spanish media. Growing up in the Spanish side of the Basque Country the only history books available were Spanish history texts. Basque history was only heard as stories or legends. As a Basque I was moved by Mark Kurlansky approach.
Rating:
Summary: The first time somebody has written positively about Basques
Review: I am a Basque woman living in New York. It is the first time I have read a positive history about my people. Unfortunately, we Basque people have not been good in keeping our written records and most of our history has been written by people who wanted to conquer and dominate us. "The Basque history of the World" is a beautiful informative book about what it is to be Basque in a world that has not been able to understand our way of life. Most countries want to expand, and to create empires. Basques did not and do not want to expand. This different point of view is not well understood by people who believe there is something strange in a group of people who have travelled all over the world, who have been among the first to go and help conquer the new world,but who have never really wanted to broaden their borders. Mark Kurlanski's attempt to try and explain the rationale of Basque people is commandable. I thank him for this pleasure.
Rating:
Summary: Changed my ideas and pre-conceptions about the Basque Nation
Review: You hear about Basques in newspapers all the time: ussually about some violent situation attributed to them. What you don't hear in the 10pm news is what these people have done for humanity, and how the good Basques have to pay up for the violence and errors made by the few ill behaved ones. Mark Kurlansky fixes that.The Author correlates the history of this little understood/known group of people, and how they have iteracted with neighboring countries, and how they have helped shape the world as we know it today. Great history book, and entertaining as well. Now I must read "Salt" and "Cod".
Rating: 
Summary: Cookbook or History
Review: This book as well as this author's other book, "COD", contain a wealth of information about cooking recipes, and it does not mix well with the historical section. This author has to decide if he wants to write a cookbook or a history book. It makes this reader hesitant to take on another book by this author entitled "Salt" , because a history of salt may bring an overwhelming list of recipes. If the reader can ignore the history v.s. cookbook controversy, then the historical section is good writing, very interesting and informative. It seems civilizations, and conquerors may come and go, but the Basques remain, always attempting to remain true to their laws and traditions. A small fringe Basque group employs violent terrorist tactics with the aim of forming a separate Basque nation. The author conveys historical sympathy with majority of peaceful Basque people against the failed policies of the central Spanish government. His view is that they are often portrayed as scapegoats. I thought this sympathy may be a case of the author becoming a little too close to his subject matter and losing his objectivity, until the recent spate of train bombings in Spain. The Spanish government's first suspect was announced to be the Basque separatist movement, but later it was discovered to be Islamic extremists. All in all, it was a very worthwhile book dealing to inform oneself about the Basques and Basque history.
Rating:
Summary: The best Basque book.......
Review: This is a great all around prep book for visiting Basque country. I then took it with me on my trip.....and everywhere I went in San Sebastian, Bilbao, etc people said: 'Oh, yes.....Kurlansky is far and away the best book about Basque country.' Any questions?
Rating:
Summary: interesting...
Review: for most parts of the book Kurlansky does give vvv interesting information on the Basques, their laguage, culture and their aspirations and mindset.... the book portrays the world through the eyes of the Basque people.... however is not a history on the Basques per se....
Rating:
Summary: If only it was based on reality
Review: I enjoyed this book until I reached the last chapters.
These last chapters (20th century) offer a very biased account of Spanish and Basque history. Misrepresentations range from mere embellishments about Basque contributions, to suspicious omissions (e.g. the most unpopular actions of the Basque ETA are not mentioned), to outright falsehoods, even about facts that can be easily checked online (e.g. the results of the Spanish Constitutional referendum of 1978 in Catalonia and Galicia, Maastricht and the EU, and so on in a long list).
All in all, I am disappointed because a case for Basque independence can be made without resorting to falsehoods. If you are really interested in Spanish and Basque history in the 20th century I suggest Raymond Carr and Paul Preston, both of them recommended by Kurlansky in the appendix (I wonder if he ever read their books).
Another anecdote that bothered me is his account of Elcano's role in the mutiny against Magellan. Grab Bergreen's "Over the Edge of the World" for a truthful and well documented account of the event.
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