Material World
The Six Raw Materials That Shape Modern Civilization
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Narrated by:
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Ed Conway
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Written by:
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Ed Conway
About this listen
THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS' CHOICE
• AN ECONOMIST BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
• Sand, salt, iron, copper, oil, and lithium. These fundamental materials have created empires, razed civilizations, and fed our ingenuity and greed for thousands of years. Without them, our modern world would not exist, and the battle to control them will determine our future.
• Finalist for the Financial Times and Schroders Business Book of the Year Award
The fiber-optic cables that weave the World Wide Web, the copper veins of our electric grids, the silicon chips and lithium batteries that power our phones and cars: though it can feel like we now live in a weightless world of information—what Ed Conway calls “the ethereal world”—our twenty-first-century lives are still very much rooted in the material.
In fact, we dug more stuff out of the earth in 2017 than in all of human history before 1950. For every ton of fossil fuels, we extract six tons of other materials, from sand to stone to wood to metal. And in Material World, Conway embarks on an epic journey across continents, cultures, and epochs to reveal the underpinnings of modern life on Earth—traveling from the sweltering depths of the deepest mine in Europe to spotless silicon chip factories in Taiwan to the eerie green pools where lithium originates.
Material World is a celebration of the humans and the human networks, the miraculous processes and the little-known companies, that combine to turn raw materials into things of wonder. This is the story of human civilization from an entirely new perspective: the ground up.
©2023 Ed Conway (P)2023 Random House AudioWhat the critics say
*Named one of the "Best Books of 2023" by The Economist*
“Rich in revelations . . . [Conway’s] analogies bring the scientific processes to life . . . Offers a fascinating lens on the intricacies of the modern supply chain, the underappreciated science behind everyday objects, and the ways that subtle—and not so subtle—changes in governmental policies shift the role of these materials in the global economy.”—Bronwen Everill, Foreign Policy
"Compelling . . . Material World [makes] strong points . . . These days, Conway reckons, humanity mines, drains, and blasts more stuff out of the ground each year than it did in total during the roughly three hundred millennia between the birth of the species and the start of the Korean War. This comes with immense consequences, both ecological and social, even if we don’t attend to them."—Elizabeth Kolbert, The New Yorker
"A spirited tour of six material things on which our lives depend. . . [Conway] ably describes how commodities interact . . . Lively and impeccably written—a welcome addition to the way-the-world-works literature."—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
What listeners say about Material World
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- Anonymous User
- 2024-03-29
A book I Just Can't Forget
Ed Conway makes geology and chemistry and modern mining production into such an exciting global story that Material World is one of my top books. I recommend this book to everyone. If you'd like to learn about real global trade as opposed to the superficial knowledge that we glean from the news media, listen to or read this book! Conway simplifies vast, complex industries and the miraculous minerals, ores, raw materials they mine. How will we keep going if we deplete basic and necessary materials for living and for maintaining our technological world? He has answers that will surprise you. His narration is excellent. Great book.
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- Anonymous User
- 2024-01-01
Excellent in linking raw materials w/daily lives
15 hrs flew by as the author took me through highlights of how these raw materials have improved our everyday lives historically and going forward.
Narration was excellent too. Highly recommended for a curious mind. Not very technical and well researched.
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- Anonymous User
- 2024-02-21
Great non-fiction that «reads» like a story
Aside from this book being a very interesting and well presented work, I’d like to stress just how well it is narrated
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