Banana by Dan Koeppel was an adventure in information and I'm now obsessed with a fruit I don't like.

Submitted by hecklinggnome t3_zzzajb in books

I'm a high school history teacher (US) and I love finding those little pieces of trivia that peak student's interest outside the classroom. This book is one page after another of just that, but it truly is much more. I have been thinking a lot about supply lines recently (as I'm sure we all have) and knowing that there is a race against time to save the 4th largest agricultural product worldwide made me think about a world both without bananas or other produce and a world with more (hopefully non-predatory) GMOs. Koeppel also makes a point throughout his book to make sure that the reader knows that overall, the banana as we consume it today is a super inconvenient fruit, but industries and governments were literally built up around just getting to further and further locales. It's a great book if you like history (especially turn of the century history) or are a consumer of produce (I hate bananas but definitely eat produce that can only be grown in certain environments). It's also a really easy book to consume if you are usually hesitant about nonfiction.

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Synthwoven t1_j2f2alu wrote

This is one of my favorite books. I am sad that most Americans are ignorant about how the U.S. was the bad guy throughout Central America during the banana republic era.

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mtnguy321 t1_j2eodp9 wrote

I just read BANANAS by Peter Chapman and found it very informative. So many varieties of bananas but we don't get but a couple. Looking forward to reading this book and BANANA REPUBLIC by Eric Rawson.

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hecklinggnome OP t1_j2etlbw wrote

I am very intrigued by the guy who runs the research center in Leuven, Belgium. Did Chapman discuss his research?

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mtnguy321 t1_j2exupz wrote

Not at all

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hecklinggnome OP t1_j2eylqd wrote

Oh my goodness, please supplement your reading with this book or look up Rony Swennen who runs the Laboratory of Tropical Crop Improvement in Belgium. Amazing guy and an amazing research group too.

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mtnguy321 t1_j2ez752 wrote

I have your book and will read it next. I also have BANANA REPUBLIC, and BANANA MEN on my list to read. Very interesting fruit!

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BadAtNamesWasTaken t1_j2ez3fg wrote

I'm intrigued, I'm gonna put this on my to read for 2023.

I have wild* bananas growing in my parents' backyard - I really can't imagine a world without bananas. It's one of the most normal plant I can think of - a house with a banana plant sticking out from behind it is one of those "standard drawings" you produce in grade school. I need to see why it's such a difficult crop to grow, and why/how it might go extinct.

*Well, I guess they aren't literally wild - it's the suburbia after all. But nobody farmed them or anything as far as we know - they just sorta do their own thing. The bananas they produce have crunchy seeds (of skittles size) inside. I promise I'm not taking the piss.

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hecklinggnome OP t1_j2fubyk wrote

No that's apparently normal for wild bananas to have seeds. There's a Himalayan variety that has seeds that "crack teeth"

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