The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, & Power
by Daniel Yergin
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Book Summary Information
Author: Daniel YerginEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 1993-01-01
ISBN: 0671799320
Number of pages: 928
Publisher: Free Press
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Book Reviews of The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, & Power
Book Review: The Prize - Buy the 2008 Edition
Summary: 5 Stars
The new edition costs the same.
Yergin's prize-winning history stretches from the first Pennsylvania oil rush in 1860 to the crash of world oil prices in 2008, and it all reads like a novel. Well, not quite. The epilogue, which covers the period after the Gulf war in 11 pages, skims along ten times faster than the rest and feels a bit more like a history lesson. But it gives you a balanced view of recent events.
I bought the original version as I started researching energy. Two full bookshelves later, I can tell you, no other book in this field holds a candle to it for fascination and information. I've read complaints about what it doesn't cover so here are some alternatives, but if you want tales of the way greed, ignorance, and cleverness respond to natural wealth and, in turn, shape world history and current global politics, this is your book.
For oil geology and exploration, read Hubbert's Peak: The Impending World Oil Shortage (New Edition). Oil industry nitty-gritty: Oil on the Brain: Petroleum's Long, Strange Trip to Your Tank. What to do about OPEC: Carbonomics: How to Fix the Climate and Charge It to OPEC. Alternatives to Oil: Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, Third Edition. Big Oil's power: The Tyranny of Oil: The World's Most Powerful Industry--and What We Must Do to Stop It.
There's no summarizing such a book, but here's the sort of tales he tells. The 1930 discovery of the Black Giant in East Texas nearly destroyed the oil industry, sending prices down to thirteen cents a barrel. After a voluntary shutdown failed, the Governor of Texas sent the Texas Rangers in on horseback. They shut down production and sent prices back up. This led to the Texas Railroad Commission becoming the first government-organized oil cartel - a model for OPEC years later.
As an economist I really appreciate the fact that Yergin gets his economics right. This is crucial for a book about price manipulation, and it's quite uncommon among popular books. For example he understands why the Saudis tried to hold price down in 1979 and why Bush Senior flew to Saudi Arabia in 1986 to try to get them to raise the price back up. Yergen helps you understand exactly why things happen in this topsey-turvey world. In any case, The Prize has been selling like hotcakes for 18 years. Whether you're fascinated by powerful historical forces or disgusted but intrigued by fossil fuel, you won't be disappointed.
Summary of The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, & Power
Pulitzer Prize Winner -- and Now an Epic PBS Series
The Prize recounts the panoramic history of oil -- and the struggle for wealth power that has always surrounded oil. This struggle has shaken the world economy, dictated the outcome of wars, and transformed the destiny of men and nations. The Prize is as much a history of the twentieth century as of the oil industry itself. The canvas of this history is enormous -- from the drilling of the first well in Pennsylvania through two great world wars to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and Operation Desert Storm.
The cast extends from wildcatters and rogues to oil tycoons, and from Winston Churchill and Ibn Saud to George Bush and Saddam Hussein. The definitive work on the subject of oil and a major contribution to understanding our century, The Prize is a book of extraordinary breadth, riveting excitement -- and great importance.
Daniel Yergin's first prize-winning book, Shattered Peace, was a history of the Cold War. Afterwards the young academic star joined the energy project of the Harvard Business School and wrote the best-seller Energy Future. Following on from there, The Prize, winner of the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction, is a comprehensive history of one of the commodities that powers the world--oil. Founded in the 19th century, the oil industry began producing kerosene for lamps and progressed to gasoline. Huge personal fortunes arose from it, and whole nations sprung out of the power politics of the oil wells. Yergin's fascinating account sweeps from early robber barons like John D. Rockefeller, to the oil crisis of the 1970s, through to the Gulf War.
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