This is my type of book: expansive subject matter - rubber's economic boom (-ish 1880-1915); crazy adventurer to structure the information around; interesting tangents galore; and an ethical conundrum to ponder.

Henry Wickham, a lower-class Englishman, in an effort to earn himself a reputation and a fortune, set his sights on rubber - he was integral in making it a ubiquitous substance today. He successfully stole 70,000 seeds and delivered them viable to Kew Gardens who eventually spread the plants to distant colonies and shifted the rubber supply from wild to plantation (from Brazil to England's colonies in East Asia) ultimately providing a more voluminous and cheaper supply. Once the vulcanization process was discovered in 1839 - hardening rubber while increasing its strength and elasticity - life demanded rubber loudly: waterproof shoes & coats then bicycles into Model T's and always war.

Wickham was an impressive adventurer but not so much a likeable individual. His field study of Hevea brasiliensis (Pará) and other rubber-producing trees, in conjunction with his experience surviving in the Amazon jungle, made his 19th-century biopiracy feat possible where others, better supported, failed. But he also convinced his mother, sister & brother + families to join him on a jungle expedition knowing firsthand the risks they'd face. He left the jungle with the seeds and his wife, Violet - the others dead or abandoned behind.

His delivery of the seeds was not life-altering as he had hoped. In continued pursuit of recognition and riches, he dragged Violet to remote and inhospitable environs - back to the Amazon jungle, to Queensland (northeastern Australia), and the Conflict Islands in Papua New Guinea. While London industrialized rapidly, the Wickhams were often fully consumed with basic survival in their far-flung homes.

In 1920, Henry was knighted for his contribution to the empire from decades earlier. He believed that the British empire was mankind's best chance at advancement. Was it in this instance? Could the Amazon basin's resources (managed by the players at the time) have supported the freedom and comfort that cheap and available rubber allowed? Or would the overall state of things be improved without this episode of colonialism ick? ( )

The lives and adventures of thousands of interesting people lie buried in the past, waiting to be re-discovered and brought to attention through the discipline of history. As the number of such individuals can be very large, it is up to historians to make decisions which stories to tell. The skills of an historian, research, work in archives and describing are skills shared by journalists, or even interested laymen or amateur historians. However, academic historians will have other considerations, such as historical relevance and relative importance of their subject, and an objective, and accurate description of the story. Journalists and amateur historians are often not bothered by such considerations, and the advantage of many journalists and some non-specialized writers have over professional historians is that the former are often much better writers. They simply tell the story better, while historical monographs are often poorly written and boring or too difficult to the wider public.

Publishers therefore publish more history books than ever, researched by journalists and amateurs. These writers are bothered by the scruples of the academics. Details and historical accuracy are not as important. A racy story all the more. Hence, many such books emphasize uniqueness rather than historical patterns. Failures are described as successes, history is a swinging adventure, empire is glorious. As towards the end of the Twentieth century, Britain's global empire, and its dismanteling and colonialism is increasingly seen as a cause for shame, while the United Kingdom is still struggling with its declining importance as a mere windy corner on the far edge of the European Union, there is a growing nostalgia for the days of empire and power. Victorian explorers are not colonial oppressors, but chivalrous rogues, who risked their lives for the empire. A noticeable trend is to portray Victorian explorers as thiefs, and naughty boys.

Joe Jackson's The thief at the end of the world. Rubber, power, and the seeds of Empire is written in a very similar vein as For all the tea in China. How England stole the world's favorite drink and changed history by Sarah Rose. Both books are about explorers, each featuring the contribution botany made to the development and financial success of the British empire. Rose describes how Robert Fortune brought tea seeds away from China in the Far East, while Jackson tells the story of the exploits of Henry Wickham acquiring rubber tree seeds from South America. Both books mention the "Wardian cases" the invention that enabled the safe transportation of fragile seedlings on clippers across climate zones and maritime spray across the globe. The book by Sarah Rose does not even attempt historical accuracy, and contains no footnotes, but The thief at the end of the world. Rubber, power, and the seeds of Empire is more pretentious listing sources and footnotes, a glossary, bibliography and index on more than 100 pages, cf pp. 309-414. However, Henry Wickham is a much less interesting person than Robert Fortune. The story about rubber is not as appealing as the story about tea, and Jackson's book is sometimes a bit too long, clearly struggling to flesh out a thin story. Both books are based on incomplete records, and Jackson often ends up speculating (cf pp. 284-5).

While Joe Jackson apparently knows how to do research, he is not such a very good writer, and his editor was clearly sleeping, or not paying enough attention. Jackson's sentences are clumsy and there are many instances where the editor should have improved the text, as the author's association was running wild. For example, on page 143-4, the author describes the vegetation of the estate Piquiá-tuba:

"On Piquiá-tuba, in addition to rubber and the indigenous piquiá, some of the more common trees included the towering, golden-crowned ipe, or ironwood tree, now known in America as the wood used for the boardwalk in Bill Gates's coastal mansion; the purple ipe, whose bark has been suggested as a possible cure for cancer; (...) and the rosewood tree, and essential ingredient in Chanel No. 5."

The deaths described on pages 151 ff. and 171 ff. are tragic, but to describe them as a "wave of death" and "wave of sickness" is exaggeration, and confusing.

Stylistically ugly is also: "By 1859, the British Honduras company, which originated as a partnership between old settler families and a London merchant, emerged as the colony's predominant landowner. It spread like an amoeba in the 1860s." (p. 220), or

"He was photographed leaning against the largest rubber tree in Ceylon (...). He wore a khaki jacket and white Captain's hat. The V's of the herringbone scars crept up the tree like chevrons. Henry rested his hand against the trunk like an old friend." (p. 283)

A remarkable passage full of speculation and rambling on without the hand of the editor, can be found on pp. 284-5:

"By then, no one remained to dispute Henry's tweaks to his legend. The adopted Indian boy disappeared after Queensland. Violet and Henry had been separated for over twenty years. After leaving the Conflicts, she dropped from the records almost as totally as the adopted boy. (...) We know they loved each other. There are secrets we'll never know, but she'd stood by him through the worst, and he'd loved her so recklessly that he swam a shark-filled channel in the middle of the night just to be with her."

The book is full of such weird sentences an passages, full of speculation, non-sensical description, and exaggeration to create an exciting narrative where there is not, and to flesh out the story. It is quite shameful for the publisher, Penguin Books to print and publish such a shoddy piece of work. ( )

A bit uneven, with the author trying too hard in place, but still a very interesting read. Didn't realize how long was the gap between Markham's transport of the hevea seedlings to Asia and the adoption of hevea as a plantation crop. Looks like Ridley is more the key to that transition. ( )

a history of the rubber industry and one of the rapes of the Amazon forest told through the stories of the adventurers -- well crafted story makes the history come alive ( )

Absorbing and well-written, a better example of its genre (biography/history/natural history) than some, including Rose's [b:For All the Tea in China: Espionage, Empire and the Secret Formula of the World's Favourite Drink|3081255|For All the Tea in China Espionage, Empire and the Secret Formula of the World's Favourite Drink|Sarah Rose|http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51y6-oSrA0L._SL75_.jpg|3112300], which treats a similar topic (biotheft on behalf of empire, destroying another power economically) but without the depth of Jackson's treatment. Here, the ethical issues are well-explored in both contemporaneous and contemporary contexts. This was a bit light on natural history, but adequate to the needs of the book's stronger elements. While Jackson occasionally strays into speculation about personalities and motives, much of the material is extensively and usefully end-noted. ( )