Tom Standage Books
Tom Standage is Deputy Editor of The Economist and editor of its annual publication The World Ahead. He is the author of several acclaimed works of popular history, including A History of the World in 6 Glasses and The Victorian Internet.
Known for: A Brief History of Motion: From the Wheel, to the Car, to What Comes Next, A History of the World in 6 Glasses
Books by Tom Standage
A Brief History of Motion: From the Wheel, to the Car, to What Comes Next
A Brief History of Motion explores 5,500 years of human transportation, from the invention of the wheel to the rise of the automobile and the uncertain future of mobility. Tom Standage examines how in...
A History of the World in 6 Glasses
This book explores world history through the lens of six influential beverages—beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea, and cola—each representing a distinct era of human civilization. Standage traces how th...
Key Insights from Tom Standage
The Invention of the Wheel
The story begins in Mesopotamia around 3500 BCE, where the simple, circular disk became one of humankind’s greatest inventions. The wheel was not born from idle curiosity but necessity: early city-states needed to move heavy goods across land. The first wheels appeared on potters’ tables, but soon s...
From A Brief History of Motion: From the Wheel, to the Car, to What Comes Next
Animal Power and Ancient Mobility
After wheels came another leap: the domestication of animals that multiplied human range and speed. Horses, camels, and oxen became the engines of empire, turning energy from muscle into momentum for entire civilizations. The chariot, especially, transformed ancient warfare into choreography of moti...
From A Brief History of Motion: From the Wheel, to the Car, to What Comes Next
Beer in the Agricultural Revolution
Beer is the first chapter of our story because it represents humanity’s profound leap from wandering hunter-gatherers to settled agricultural communities. The earliest evidence of beer dates back to ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt, where people discovered that wet grains spontaneously fermented. What ...
From A History of the World in 6 Glasses
Wine and the Rise of Civilization
Wine belongs to the age of refinement and intellect — to ancient Greece and Rome, where it embodied taste, hierarchy, and discourse. In the author’s vision, wine represents the moment when civilization began to think about itself deliberately — what is beautiful, what is good, what is wise. Unlike ...
From A History of the World in 6 Glasses
About Tom Standage
Tom Standage is Deputy Editor of The Economist and editor of its annual publication The World Ahead. He is the author of several acclaimed works of popular history, including A History of the World in 6 Glasses and The Victorian Internet. His writing often explores the intersection of technology, hi...
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Tom Standage is Deputy Editor of The Economist and editor of its annual publication The World Ahead. He is the author of several acclaimed works of popular history, including A History of the World in 6 Glasses and The Victorian Internet. His writing often explores the intersection of technology, hi...
Tom Standage is Deputy Editor of The Economist and editor of its annual publication The World Ahead. He is the author of several acclaimed works of popular history, including A History of the World in 6 Glasses and The Victorian Internet. His writing often explores the intersection of technology, history, and society.
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Tom Standage is Deputy Editor of The Economist and editor of its annual publication The World Ahead. He is the author of several acclaimed works of popular history, including A History of the World in 6 Glasses and The Victorian Internet.
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