What do you think?
Rate this book
The Salt Roads: How Fish Made a Culture
This is the extraordinary story of how salt fish from Shetland became one of the staple foods of Europe, powered an economic boom and inspired artists, writers and musicians.
It ranges from the wild waters of the North Atlantic, the ice-filled fjords of Greenland and the remote islands of Faroe to the dining tables of London’s middle classes, the bacalao restaurants of Spain and the Jewish shtetls of Eastern Europe.
As well as following the historical thread and exploring how very different cultures were drawn together by the salt fish trade, John Goodlad meets those whose lives revolve around the industry in the twenty-first century and addresses today’s pressing themes of sustainability, climate change and food choices.
It ranges from the wild waters of the North Atlantic, the ice-filled fjords of Greenland and the remote islands of Faroe to the dining tables of London’s middle classes, the bacalao restaurants of Spain and the Jewish shtetls of Eastern Europe.
As well as following the historical thread and exploring how very different cultures were drawn together by the salt fish trade, John Goodlad meets those whose lives revolve around the industry in the twenty-first century and addresses today’s pressing themes of sustainability, climate change and food choices.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published September 1, 2022
11 people are currently reading
126 people want to read
About the author
John Goodlad
3 books1 followerJohn Goodlad is a Shetlander who works in the seafood industry. He was the voice of the Shetland fishing industry as CEO of the Shetland Fishermen's Association for many years before becoming a fish farmer. He now advises several national and international seafood organisations and companies. His previous book, The Cod Hunters, was shortlisted for the Maritime Foundation’s Mountbatten Award for Best Maritime Book in 2020.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
November 4, 2022
I really enjoying reading this book. I have a special interest in fisheries history and management, helped train some fisheries managers, and researched the the intersection of fisheries culture and marine and coastal tourism. I’ve read some of The Cod Hunters but found the writing and story telling style of The Salt Roads to be much more accessible, especially to the general reader; and I appreciate that the weight and size of the book is easier to hold :). My favorite chapters are Heglies Bank, Vaila Mae and Remnants of Norn. If you love exploring maritime history from the perspective of those whose lives were living it, this book is for you. There is some overlap with information that is in The Cod Hunters, but the writing in Salt Roads is among the best of the for the general public natural history/management/fisheries/maritime culture books I’ve read. It also has some science and management for those interested in fisheries management (including discussion of Hilborn’s research on CO2 costs of different protein sources). I think this book would also be fascinating for sailors (because of the focus on sailing techniques, boat construction, and navigation) and anyone who eats seafood. Of course the many young men and women working for the various save the ocean NGOs should read this book to gain perspective. Thank you John for sharing your wisdom and passion with the rest of us.
December 2, 2022
This is a remarkable book. It not only covers the history of Shetland fishing in an economical informative manner it does so with imaginative storytelling.
The storytelling is quite engaging, sometimes just simply captivating and the fishing disasters are very moving. The progress and successes of fishing in the Shetlands are also told in an engaging way.
The author also incorporates in totally appropriate ways how the occasional artist representations and the more often folk music connections have been present. The culture of the Shetlands including the gradually overwhelmed Shetlandic language (derived from the Viking Norn) are referenced especially in comparison to the success of the Faroes in maintaining its language and maximising its political independence .
Having visited the Shetlands and its truly amazing scenery this book was a double pleasure to read.
The storytelling is quite engaging, sometimes just simply captivating and the fishing disasters are very moving. The progress and successes of fishing in the Shetlands are also told in an engaging way.
The author also incorporates in totally appropriate ways how the occasional artist representations and the more often folk music connections have been present. The culture of the Shetlands including the gradually overwhelmed Shetlandic language (derived from the Viking Norn) are referenced especially in comparison to the success of the Faroes in maintaining its language and maximising its political independence .
Having visited the Shetlands and its truly amazing scenery this book was a double pleasure to read.
November 29, 2022
A wonderful account not just of an industry, but of the cultures that it spawned, and the heroism that sustained it.
February 8, 2023
This is a charming well-informed history of Shetland’s fishing history by a Shetlander born and bred. After a couple of annoying national stereotypes about Dutch, “Germanic and Slavic peoples” early on, it develops an engaging history of the development of Shetland from the 18th century. It explains laird and crofter society, the truck system and perpetual debt of the islands’ peasants. There’s lots of detail about the small sixern boats, the haaf (deep sea) fishing season, the distant cod fisheries and all the various aspects of the developing fishing industry. The anecdotes have an intimate, gossipy feel as you’d expect of the story of a small community, which heightens the horror of the many young lives lost at sea by accidents and storms.
The relationship between Shetland, Faroe and Basque Country ─ where and how they fished is particularly interesting, forged by proximity, shared poverty and ingenuity. This is a predominantly male history but the author notes, the "social revolution in Shetland" where ordinary fishers became boat owners and herring-gutters travelled to become independent, money-earning women.
The author is equally interested in the future of fishing and sustainability and is highly critical of the NGO’s such as WWF and Greenpeace and the “eco warriors” he's met who criticise various fishing methods and fish farms. Unless you have read the back inner cover you may not know at this point in the book that John Goodlad is a fish farmer himself. About the campaign to remove salmon farms from British Columbia, he says it was, “an emotional campaign devoid of science but expert at social media” and, "That privileged rich people are prepared to curtail one of the most efficient methods of producing food for the sake of an environmental fantasy when hunger still stalks the globe is scandalous."
The problem with his argument is that campaigns against fish farming are based on science ─ the environmental damage from so many fish farms and the threat to wild stocks of salmon, for instance, from escaped domesticated salmon where interbreeding undermines wild genes. The people making these arguments in peer-reviewed papers are not “eco-warriors”, they are scientists.
The problems for marine environments and the species living there are so huge from climate change, overfishing, pollution and habitat degradation that to many environmentalists it’s common sense to create Marine Protected Areas, Marine Parks or no fish zones etc. But the biggest problem is simple ─ it’s that fishing, like everything else, is driven by the logic of accumulation for profit. So trawlers must get “more efficient”, that is larger and more powerful to drive down costs and drive profit up and competing for declining stocks sets trawlers against Creel fishers. Ordinary fishers aren’t responsible for the crisis and they can be part of the solution but only if we tackle the underlying system, fossil-fuel guzzling and all.
Ultimately, Goodlad’s argument is that fishing can feed the expanding world population and does far less damage than meat farming. But there is already enough food to feed the world (UNFAO figures not my opinion) and yet a billion people went to bed hungry tonight because they could not afford to buy food. We can argue about whether the world’s population will actually grow beyond 2050 but ending on, "If you want to save the planet, eat farmed mussels..followed by mackerel", just doesn’t want to look capitalism ─ the source of fishing's problems in the face.
The relationship between Shetland, Faroe and Basque Country ─ where and how they fished is particularly interesting, forged by proximity, shared poverty and ingenuity. This is a predominantly male history but the author notes, the "social revolution in Shetland" where ordinary fishers became boat owners and herring-gutters travelled to become independent, money-earning women.
The author is equally interested in the future of fishing and sustainability and is highly critical of the NGO’s such as WWF and Greenpeace and the “eco warriors” he's met who criticise various fishing methods and fish farms. Unless you have read the back inner cover you may not know at this point in the book that John Goodlad is a fish farmer himself. About the campaign to remove salmon farms from British Columbia, he says it was, “an emotional campaign devoid of science but expert at social media” and, "That privileged rich people are prepared to curtail one of the most efficient methods of producing food for the sake of an environmental fantasy when hunger still stalks the globe is scandalous."
The problem with his argument is that campaigns against fish farming are based on science ─ the environmental damage from so many fish farms and the threat to wild stocks of salmon, for instance, from escaped domesticated salmon where interbreeding undermines wild genes. The people making these arguments in peer-reviewed papers are not “eco-warriors”, they are scientists.
The problems for marine environments and the species living there are so huge from climate change, overfishing, pollution and habitat degradation that to many environmentalists it’s common sense to create Marine Protected Areas, Marine Parks or no fish zones etc. But the biggest problem is simple ─ it’s that fishing, like everything else, is driven by the logic of accumulation for profit. So trawlers must get “more efficient”, that is larger and more powerful to drive down costs and drive profit up and competing for declining stocks sets trawlers against Creel fishers. Ordinary fishers aren’t responsible for the crisis and they can be part of the solution but only if we tackle the underlying system, fossil-fuel guzzling and all.
Ultimately, Goodlad’s argument is that fishing can feed the expanding world population and does far less damage than meat farming. But there is already enough food to feed the world (UNFAO figures not my opinion) and yet a billion people went to bed hungry tonight because they could not afford to buy food. We can argue about whether the world’s population will actually grow beyond 2050 but ending on, "If you want to save the planet, eat farmed mussels..followed by mackerel", just doesn’t want to look capitalism ─ the source of fishing's problems in the face.
June 27, 2024
The first part of this book is a series of accounts from the heyday of the North Atlantic fishing industry. They are a touching mix, showing how much danger was faced by fishers well into the 20th century. The author has a deep knowledge of history and the links he draws between Shetland, the Faroes and mainland Europe are fascinating.
The more contemporary sections are quite a mixed bag. Industries come and go but whether this is due to overexploitation, changes in access to fishing grounds or changing preferences is never really explained. The author tells us over and over again that modern fishing industries are sustainably managed, but not how this is measured or whether the various accreditation schemes are reliable. It seems to boil down to 'trust us, we're regulating ourselves' without ever explaining how the rules work.
Along this line, the sections on challenges to the fishing industry are a series of stories where the author either delivers a devastating repartee to an environmentalist or is cruelly excluded from a meeting. It's a shame he didn't engage with critics' arguments more thoughtfully. Given he is a fish farmer, there was also a surprising lack of discussion on the issues in that part of the industry. The remark in the final section that eating fish is naturally more sustainable than eating 'avocados, coconut milk and nuts... [which] are flown halfway around the world before they arrive on our supermarket shelves' is so obviously wrong (these bulk products are almost always sea freighted to Europe) that I wonder how many other obvious mistakes are scattered through the book.
In summary - an enjoyable work of history, but with only superficial discussion of the issues facing fisheries today.
The more contemporary sections are quite a mixed bag. Industries come and go but whether this is due to overexploitation, changes in access to fishing grounds or changing preferences is never really explained. The author tells us over and over again that modern fishing industries are sustainably managed, but not how this is measured or whether the various accreditation schemes are reliable. It seems to boil down to 'trust us, we're regulating ourselves' without ever explaining how the rules work.
Along this line, the sections on challenges to the fishing industry are a series of stories where the author either delivers a devastating repartee to an environmentalist or is cruelly excluded from a meeting. It's a shame he didn't engage with critics' arguments more thoughtfully. Given he is a fish farmer, there was also a surprising lack of discussion on the issues in that part of the industry. The remark in the final section that eating fish is naturally more sustainable than eating 'avocados, coconut milk and nuts... [which] are flown halfway around the world before they arrive on our supermarket shelves' is so obviously wrong (these bulk products are almost always sea freighted to Europe) that I wonder how many other obvious mistakes are scattered through the book.
In summary - an enjoyable work of history, but with only superficial discussion of the issues facing fisheries today.
June 16, 2024
I recently added to my collection the Lerwick library card and lent this book with it. Being in Shetland, I enjoy reading about the people and places I see from the bus window on my way to Scalloway, as getting to know them add another layer of depth to my séjour here. I do not envy the life of the fishermen and their families who often faced death in order to have the least in life. The harsh environment of the archipelago made a culture, but the people also shaped the environment in drastic ways. This easily relates to my dissertation topic, reassuring me that the usual distinction between humans and the environment is lesser than we like to admit.
August 2, 2024
This is a good view of the history and possible future of Salt Fishing based in Shetland.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews