Forever Young: A cultural history of longevity by Lucian Boia, Reaktion Books, 拢16.95/$25, ISBN 1861891547 Reviewed by James Kingsland
WHERE did we go wrong? Adam lived to the age of 930 and his grandson Methuselah to 969. The first generations of Chinese and Indian people are said to have lived for thousands of years. In our time, however, Jeanne Calment only clocked up a measly 122 years.
Historian Lucian Boia of the University of Bucharest, Romania, is as much concerned with the mythology of longevity as the reality. In Forever Young, he demonstrates how little our obsession with cheating death has changed.
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The Greek philosopher Gorgias was among the first to suggest a formula for long life, which included never taking the 鈥減leasures of the table鈥� to excess. In the 14th century, Roger Bacon attributed the decline in longevity from biblical levels to moral weakness and bad eating habits. He recommended a diet of meat, egg yolks and red wine. Sound familiar?
Luigi Cornaro almost died of overindulgence at the age of 40 in Renaissance Italy, but began to 鈥済row younger鈥� after going on a diet of 12 ounces of solid food and 14 ounces of liquid per day. He almost reached his century.
By the 1800s, Francis Bacon was recommending a less ascetic alternative of frequent purging using dietary supplements of opium and powdered gold. As now, life extension came at a price.