Wrigley is deservedly renowned as both an indefatigable collector and as an insightful analyzer and synthesizer of primary data. All of his skills are amply demonstrated in this brief volume. The title, and particularly the subtitle of the volume, announce a broad intention to document the unique change in human societies—the simultaneous attainment of unprecedented increases in material welfare and population growth—that began in early modern Britain and reached fruition in the late nineteenth century. A hallmark of that Industrial Revolution was the extensive use of energy from fossil fuel in the form of coal. Wrigley sees this move from dependence on organic processes as the defining feature of the transition to sustained growth. As he notes in his final paragraphs, current concern about the impact of fossil fuel on global climate gives this focus a modern relevance.
The volume revolves around the process by which society largely replaced and...