Synopses & Reviews
An utterly original exploration of the world of human waste that will surprise, outrageand entertain
Produced behind closed doors, disposed of discreetly, and hidden by euphemism, bodily waste is something common to all and as natural as breathing, yet we prefer not to talk about it. But we shouldeven those of us who take care of our business in pristine, sanitary conditions. For its not only in developing countries that human waste is a major public health threat: population growth is taxing even the most advanced sewage systems, and the disease spread by waste kills more people worldwide every year than any other single cause of death. Even in America, 1.95 million people have no access to an indoor toilet. Yet the subject remains unmentionable.
The Big Necessity takes aim at the taboo, revealing everything that matters about how people doand dontdeal with their own waste. Moving from the deep underground sewers of Paris, London, and New Yorkan infrastructure disaster waiting to happento an Indian slum where ten toilets are shared by 60,000 people, Rose George stops along the way to explore the potential saviors: Chinas five million biogas digesters, which produce energy from waste; the heroes of third world sanitation movements; the inventor of the humble Car Loo; and the U.S. Armys personal lasers used by soldiers to zap their feces in the field.
With razor-sharp wit and crusading urgency, mixing levity with gravity, Rose George has turned the subject we like to avoid into a cause with the most serious of consequences.
Rose George is a freelance writer and journalist who regularly contributes to Slate, The Guardian, The Independent, and the Financial Times. She lives in London.
Produced behind closed doors, disposed of discreetly, and hidden by euphemism, bodily waste is something common to all and as natural as breathing, yet we prefer not to talk about it. But we shouldeven those of us who take care of our business in pristine, sanitary conditions. For its not only in developing countries that human waste is a major public health threat: population growth is taxing even the most advanced sewage systems, and the disease spread by waste kills more people worldwide every year than any other single cause of death. Even in America, 1.95 million people have no access to an indoor toilet. Yet the subject remains unmentionable.
The Big Necessity takes aim at the taboo, revealing everything that matters about how people doand dontdeal with their own waste. Moving from the deep underground sewers of Paris, London, and New Yorkan infrastructure disaster waiting to happento an Indian slum where ten toilets are shared by 60,000 people, Rose George stops along the way to explore the potential saviors: Chinas five million biogas digesters, which produce energy from waste; the heroes of third world sanitation movements; the inventor of the humble Car Loo; and the U.S. Armys personal lasers used by soldiers to zap their feces in the field.
In this original exploration of a world both familiar and unfamiliar to all humankind, Rose George has turned the subject we like to avoid into a cause with the most serious of consequences.
"In the name of research, Ms. George waded through sewers and checked out latrines all over the globe. On paper, she glides with rueful and articulate poise through the biology, ecology, physiology, psychology and basic hydraulics of her subject, always articulate and persuasive. Even if you are inclined to think health-care dollars should be put into titanium rather than porcelain, you will be hard pressed to put this extraordinary book down."Abigail Zuger, M.D., The New York Times
"Rose George's The Big Necessity should become a classic in the limited literary annals of coprology. George, who is British, is an ebullient descendant of the virtuous Victorians, including Thomas Crapper, who brought us modern plumbing. With wit and style, she goes to sewage school, ventures into the sewers of London and New York, attends international toilet conferences and visits cities, villages, townships and slums in Africa, Europe, the United States, India, Japan and China. Along the way, she shines a spotlight on unknown but charismatic leaders in South Africa, heroic campaigners in India and industrious Chinese reformers who have converted 15.4 million rural households to biogas digesters: a cheap and inexhaustible supply of clean energy. She even reveals the wonders of Japanese 'washletsa generic word for a high-function toilet'especially the warm toilet seat manufactured by Toto. With $4.2 billion in sales in 2006, Toto has entranced the Japanese . . . The Big Necessity is a valuable and often entertaining, if somewhat dismal, account of the travails of human waste disposal."Anna Sklar, Los Angeles Times
"Let's get the cover-blurb pander out of the way up front: If you buy just one book about human feces this year, make sure it's Rose George's The Big Necessity. Most people older than 9 prefer not to think much about the organic amalgam the American sanitation industry, in an excellent example of corporate euphemism, calls bio-solids. (Other, more poetic cultures prefer night soil; Rose George's English compatriots once called it 'gunge.' The author herself typically uses the sturdy old s-word. The Big Necessity is nothing if not frank.) Yet George's lucid, intrepid book of globe-spanning reportage not only sustains this apparently mundane subject for 304 pages, but it also leaves a reader both outraged and unexpectedly inspired. Night soil will never seem the same again. First, of course, George must overcome the natural reflex to laugh at her subject. The Big Necessity isn't exactly dourprepare to discover the She-Pee female urinal and a latrine-emptying device called the Gulperbut, as George establishes, gunge is serious business. After all, certain prerequisites underlie civilized human life, and police, fire and espresso service all come after sanitation. Rome built its Cloaca Maxima in about 600 B.C.; without it there never would have been an empire. George lays out a shocking indictment of what we've accomplished since then . . . [George] makes an engaging and hardheaded guide, the kind of reporter who doesn't mind recounting her own urinary experiences in rural China. In the far-flung and unplumbed corners of a very septic world, she discovers a welter of solutions to the planet's s-word dilemma. She introduces Indian toilet entrepreneurs, South African cleanliness evangelists, Tanzania's Gulper inventors and China's impressive biogas digesters, handy devices that ferment human and animal waste into heating, cooking and lighting fuel. These efforts are as diverse as the places they serve, but the successful ones share a few common characteristics: They're low tech, decentralized, cheap and grassroots. The most promising, like biogas, transform a liability into an asset. (In contrast to these earthy undertakings, George's enthusiasm for Japan's scary computerized super-toilets is a bit unseemly. Just what we all need: another home appliance we can't fix. Long live the ballcock, that handy little mechanism that fills the water tank in your flush toilet.) The Big Necessity connects one of the oldest problems in human life (man's gotta eat, and man's gottawell, you know) with a future likely to fall somewhere between the high-industrial grandeur underneath
Review
“Rose George's subject—the global politics of defecation—is both superbly indelicate and morally imperative. With the basic health and dignity of several billion poor people at stake, we need to take s**t seriously in the most literal sense. Human solidarity, as she so passionately demonstrates, begins with the squatting multitudes.”—Mike Davis, author of Planet of Slums
“In Rose Georges hometown in England, impoverished immigrants took up residence in the new public latrines. (‘Fighting over the more spacious disabled cubicle was fierce.) Which is worse? Living in a toilet or living without one? George bravely—and sometimes literally—submerges herself in the tragedy and occasional comedy of global sanitation. Sludge, biogas, New York City sewage: I ate it up and wanted more! The most unforgettable book to pass through the publishing pipeline in years.”—Mary Roach, author of Stiff
"This fascinating, wise, and scrupulously drawn portrait of the world and its waste will last long as a seriously important book. Like a literary treatment farm, it manages to turn the completely unpalatable into something utterly irresistible. Rose George, a brave, compassionate, and ceaselessly impeccable reporter—and, when needed, a very funny one too—has performed for us all who care a very great service. A big necessity, indeed."—Simon Winchester, author of The Man Who Loved China
"This engaging, highly readable book puts sanitation in its proper place—as a central challenge in human development. Rose George has tackled this critical topic with insight, wit, and a storytellers flair."—Louis Boorstin, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
"Rose George has trolled the gutters of the world for the predictable low-matter and come up with something weirdly spiritual. Worship the porcelain god, revere its ubiquity and protest its absence: George reveals that the act of private and sanitary defecation is the key to health, the wealth of nations, and even civilization itself."—Lisa Margonelli, author of Oil on the Brain
Review
“Rose George's subjectthe global politics of defecationis both superbly indelicate and morally imperative. With the basic health and dignity of several billion poor people at stake, we need to take s**t seriously in the most literal sense. Human solidarity, as she so passionately demonstrates, begins with the squatting multitudes.”Mike Davis, author of Planet of Slums
“In Rose Georges hometown in England, impoverished immigrants took up residence in the new public latrines. (‘Fighting over the more spacious disabled cubicle was fierce.) Which is worse? Living in a toilet or living without one? George bravelyand sometimes literallysubmerges herself in the tragedy and occasional comedy of global sanitation. Sludge, biogas, New York City sewage: I ate it up and wanted more! The most unforgettable book to pass through the publishing pipeline in years.”Mary Roach, author of Stiff
"This fascinating, wise, and scrupulously drawn portrait of the world and its waste will last long as a seriously important book. Like a literary treatment farm, it manages to turn the completely unpalatable into something utterly irresistible. Rose George, a brave, compassionate, and ceaselessly impeccable reporterand, when needed, a very funny one toohas performed for us all who care a very great service. A big necessity, indeed."Simon Winchester, author of The Man Who Loved China
"This engaging, highly readable book puts sanitation in its proper placeas a central challenge in human development. Rose George has tackled this critical topic with insight, wit, and a storytellers flair."Louis Boorstin, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
"Rose George has trolled the gutters of the world for the predictable low-matter and come up with something weirdly spiritual. Worship the porcelain god, revere its ubiquity and protest its absence: George reveals that the act of private and sanitary defecation is the key to health, the wealth of nations, and even civilization itself."Lisa Margonelli, author of Oil on the Brain Page Traynor - Brian Lehrer, host of On the Media, National Public Radio - James McBride, author of The Color of Water and Miracle at St. Anna - Kevin J. Anderson - Dorothy Allison - Philip Lopate - Clive Cussler - Jon Winokur - Tony Hillerman - Jonathan Kellerman - W.E.B. 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Review
“Rose George writes smart books about subjects we mostly prefer not to think about.… The Big Necessity is among the best nonfiction books of the new millennium.”
—Dwight Garner, The New York Times
“Always articulate and persuasive… You will be hard-pressed to put this extraordinary book down.”
— Abigail Zuger, The New York Times
“Superb… The Big Necessity belongs in a rare handful of studies that take a subject that seems fixed and familiar and taboo and make us understand that it is historically contingent and dazzlingly intriguing. Jessica Mitford did it with her classic study The American Way of Death; Michel Foucault did it with Madness and Civilization. Rose George has produced their equal: a gleaming toilet manifesto for humankind.”
—Slate
“The Big Necessity, Rose Georges perfectly disquieting new book, is very good… With wit, narrative skill, and compassion, it allows us to examine a major international public health nuisance… Thats not to say that the book is all gloom and doom or a ponderous drag. In fact, its a breeze. Ms. George is a lucid, supple writer, and approaching the subject as a journalist, shes able to tell her story on several different registers. And, quite honestly, the topic is fascinating.”
—New York Observer
“[Written] with wit and style… Valuable and often entertaining… Should become a classic in the annals of coprology.”
—Los Angeles Times
“Fascinating and eloquent.”
—The Economist
“A persuasive volume.”
—Entertainment Weekly
“Delves into the taboo subject with tact, sensitivity—and the right amount of style… George introduces the reader to a fascinating and enlightening universe.”
—Time
“One smart book… delving deep into the history and implications of a daily act that dare not speak its name.”
—Newsweek
“The weight of information that Rose George brings to The Big Necessity is astonishing… There are so many interesting stories in the book that I wanted to tell everyone about what I learned.”
—Cleveland Plain Dealer
“Full of fascinating facts… An intrepid, erudite and entertaining journey through the public consequences of this most private behavior.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“George leavens her serious, if unpalatable, topic with an elegant and witty prose style. An important book… strongly recommended.”
—Library Journal (starred review)
“An utterly disarming and engrossing tour… George writes unflinchingly and with great style.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“A unique, alarming, and strangely fascinating book… Witty, anecdotal, and sharply informative, Georges far-reaching exposé ultimately recalibrates nothing less than our understanding of civilization.”
—Booklist
“A very important book.… Rose George has done us a great service by taking something that we don't talk about nearly often enough and putting it right in our faces. Anyone heading overseas on a mission trip should read this book first. And anyone who wants to understand what it means to be poor.”
—Bill McKibben, author of Deep Economy
“Rose George's subject—the global politics of defecation—is both superbly indelicate and morally imperative. With the basic health and dignity of several billion poor people at stake, we need to take shit seriously in the most literal sense. Human solidarity, as she so passionately demonstrates, begins with the squatting multitudes.”
—Mike Davis, author of Planet of Slums
“Which is worse? Living in a toilet or living without one? George bravely—and sometimes literally—submerges herself in the tragedy and occasional comedy of global sanitation. Sludge, biogas, New York City sewage: I ate it up and wanted more! The most unforgettable book to pass through the publishing pipeline in years.”
—Mary Roach, author of Stiff
“This engaging, highly readable book puts sanitation in its proper place—as a central challenge in human development. Rose George has tackled this critical topic with insight, wit, and a storytellers flair.”
—Louis Boorstin, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
“Excellent… Definitely recommended.”
—Tyler Cowen, author of Discover Your Inner Economist
“Rose George has trolled the gutters of the world for the predictable low-matter and come up with something weirdly spiritual. Worship the porcelain god, revere its ubiquity and protest its absence: George reveals that the act of private and sanitary defecation is the key to health, the wealth of nations, and even civilization itself.”
—Lisa Margonelli, author of Oil on the Brain
“Highly recommended… One of the best nonfiction books Ive read in years.”
—Henry Gee, senior editor of Nature
“This fascinating, wise, and scrupulously drawn portrait of the world and its waste will last long as a seriously important book. Like a literary treatment farm, it manages to turn the completely unpalatable into something utterly irresistible. Rose George, a brave, compassionate, and ceaselessly impeccable reporter—and, when needed, a very funny one too—has performed for us all who care a very great service. A big necessity, indeed.”
—Simon Winchester, author of The Man Who Loved China
“Throughout her exploration of the dark and pungent world of human waste and its disposal, George remains curious, sceptical, open-minded and remarkably good-humoured… She has written a tactful, outspoken, amusing, shocking, highly informative and useful book. It may even—if you read it carefully—change your life.”
—Sunday Telegraph (UK)
“Will entertain and edify… A revealing global study thats thoroughly researched and written with both wit and moral seriousness.”
—Daily Telegraph (UK)
“As far as I can tell, this is the first popular study to be written on the subject. And popular it deserves to be. Rose George has just the right kind of breezy-serious approach needed to grapple with the universal taboos.”
—Daily Mail (UK)
“An invaluable contribution.”
—The Guardian (UK)
“Bravely and ably meets the challenge… For daring to fling back the privy door, George deserves a medal.”
—The Sunday Times (UK)
Synopsis
An utterly original exploration of the world of human waste that will surprise, outrage—and entertain
Produced behind closed doors, disposed of discreetly, and hidden by euphemism, bodily waste is something common to all and as natural as breathing, yet we prefer not to talk about it. But we should—even those of us who take care of our business in pristine, sanitary conditions. For its not only in developing countries that human waste is a major public health threat: population growth is taxing even the most advanced sewage systems, and the disease spread by waste kills more people worldwide every year than any other single cause of death. Even in America, 1.95 million people have no access to an indoor toilet. Yet the subject remains unmentionable.
The Big Necessity takes aim at the taboo, revealing everything that matters about how people do—and dont—deal with their own waste. Moving from the deep underground sewers of Paris, London, and New York—an infrastructure disaster waiting to happen—to an Indian slum where ten toilets are shared by 60,000 people, Rose George stops along the way to explore the potential saviors: Chinas five million biogas digesters, which produce energy from waste; the heroes of third world sanitation movements; the inventor of the humble Car Loo; and the U.S. Armys personal lasers used by soldiers to zap their feces in the field.
With razor-sharp wit and crusading urgency, mixing levity with gravity, Rose George has turned the subject we like to avoid into a cause with the most serious of consequences.
Synopsis
An utterly original exploration of the world of human waste, "The Big Necessity" takes aim at the taboo and reveals everything that matters about how people do--and don't--deal with their own waste.
Synopsis
“One smart book . . . delving deep into the history and implications of a daily act that dare not speak its name.” —NewsweekAcclaimed as “extraordinary” (The New York Times) and “a classic” (Los Angeles Times), The Big Necessity is on its way to removing the taboo on bodily waste—something common to all and as natural as breathing. We prefer not to talk about it, but we should—even those of us who take care of our business in pristine, sanitary conditions. Disease spread by waste kills more people worldwide every year than any other single cause of death. Even in America, nearly two million people have no access to an indoor toilet. Yet the subject remains unmentionable.
Moving from the underground sewers of Paris, London, and New York (an infrastructure disaster waiting to happen) to an Indian slum where ten toilets are shared by 60,000 people, The Big Necessity breaks the silence, revealing everything that matters about how people do—and dont—deal with their own waste. With razor-sharp wit and crusading urgency, mixing levity with gravity, Rose George has turned the subject we like to avoid into a cause with the most serious of consequences.
About the Author
Rose George is a freelance writer and journalist who regularly contributes to Slate, The Guardian, The Independent, and the Financial Times. She lives in London.