Mark Kurlansky Quote
At the time when Pope Pius VII had to leave Rome, which had been conquered by revolutionary French, the committee of the Chamber of Commerce in London was considering the herring fishery. One member of the committee observed that, since the Pope had been forced to leave Rome, Italy was probably going to become a Protestant country. Heaven help us, cried another member. What, responded the first, would you be upset to see the number of good Protestants increase? No, the other answered, it isn’t that, but suppose there are no more Catholics, what shall we do with our herring?—Alexandre Dumas, Le grand dictionnaire de cuisine, 1873
Mark Kurlansky
At the time when Pope Pius VII had to leave Rome, which had been conquered by revolutionary French, the committee of the Chamber of Commerce in London was considering the herring fishery. One member of the committee observed that, since the Pope had been forced to leave Rome, Italy was probably going to become a Protestant country. Heaven help us, cried another member. What, responded the first, would you be upset to see the number of good Protestants increase? No, the other answered, it isn’t that, but suppose there are no more Catholics, what shall we do with our herring?—Alexandre Dumas, Le grand dictionnaire de cuisine, 1873
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About Mark Kurlansky
Mark Kurlansky (December 7, 1948) is an American journalist and author who has written a number of books of fiction and nonfiction. His 1997 book, Cod: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World (1997), was an international bestseller and was translated into more than fifteen languages. His book Nonviolence: Twenty-five Lessons From the History of a Dangerous Idea (2006) was the nonfiction winner of the 2007 Dayton Literary Peace Prize.