The Consumer Revolution, 1650-1800.

This, the book that launched a thousand dissertations over the past forty years, has created something of a cottage industry called "consumption studies", to which Kwass himself has been a major contributor. These are the terms in which Honoré de Balzac describes the eponymous character of I Le Père Goriot i (1835), and in many ways they serve as a perfect introduction to Michael Kwass's new book on the "consumer revolution". 'Every day he chose a fresh white I piqué i waistcoat, beneath which his pear-shaped, protuberant belly would wobble around, causing a heavy gold chain hung with watch-charms to bounce.... His snuffbox, also made of gold, contained a locket full of hair.... His armoires (which he pronounced " I ormoires i " as those of humble station do) were crammed with an abundance of his household silverware'. [Extracted from the article]