The Hindu Business Line : Is gold the supreme possession?

THE gold fever rages on. It closed at a 22-year high of $502.50, as Los Angeles Times reports an hour ago. Gold returns to its `80s heights, remembers Chicago Tribune. And CNN suggests, "`Tis the season to buy some bling," and predicts that jewellery may turn out to be "one of the holiday season's best deals." A better deal, in my view, would be Peter L. Bernstein's engaging narrative of "the history of an obsession" in The Power of Gold, from Wiley (www.wiley.com) .

The book tells the story of "how people have become intoxicated, obsessed, haunted, humbled, and exalted over pieces of metal called gold." Gold has inspired some of the humanity's greatest achievements, and provoked some of its worst crimes, writes Bernstein, quite philosophically.

`Get gold at all hazards' looks like a dangerous diktat but that's chapter 1, where the author informs how shafts to fetch the ore reach down as far as 12,000 feet and temperature reaches 130 degrees Fahrenheit. "To produce one ounce of fine gold, it requires 38 man-hours, 1,400 gallons of water, electricity to run a large house for 10 days, 282 to 565 cubic feet of air under straining pressure, and quantities of chemicals including cyanide, acids, lead, borax, and lime." Plus, perhaps, a helpless husband pulling out his wallet!

How nice if one had the Midas's touch! He had inherited but two oxen, informs the author. It was Bacchus who granted Midas the boon, after being impressed with his hospitality.

After discovering food turn into gold, and his daughter morph into a statue, Midas pressed the `undo' button to reverse the boon. He transferred his golden touch to the Pactolus River, thus ending up "with the best of both possible worlds." Where is this river? "The actual location of the Pactolus is no longer visible, but geographers believe that it was a stream carrying alluvial gold from the slopes of Mount Timolus in Anatolia."

Burying gold has been an ancient practice, notes the author, citing evidence from archaeology. "Because gold is chemically inert, it survives the passage of time, the ravages of nature, the vagaries of the weather, and the machinations of humans," he reasons.

Filled with nuggets of history, the book offers insight on other areas of human endeavour too. Such as how by 500 BC "golden diadems, earrings, bracelets, and plaques were being created," in Peru with "clear Chinese and Vietnamese influences," suggesting that "Asian sailors were finding their way across the Pacific at a time when Europeans were barely managing to paddle themselves around the Mediterranean." Bernstein concedes, however, that there is no information on whether "the Asian sailors ever found their way back."

Tracing the fortunes of empires, the author rues that disappointment, disillusion, and defeat overcame everyone who was "so blinded in the pursuit of a hoard of gold that they could not comprehend the difference between useless metal and real wealth." Some lessons have been learned by the present day politicians, though their passion for wealth leads them into newer scandals.

Is gold the supreme possession - `for power and glory, for beauty, for security, and even for immortality'? Wait before you nod vigorously. For, Bernstein cautions that those who believed gold to be a hedge against uncertainties in life "failed to understand that the pursuit of eternity is not to be satisfied by gold."

Gold as an end in itself is meaningless, he reminds. "Hoarding does not create wealth," writes Bernstein. "Gold and its surrogates make sense only as a means to an end: to beautify, to adorn, to exchange for what we need and really want."

Helpful read, if you are trying to recover from the shock you suffered after that one more gold-shopping trip with your wife!

SayCheek@TheHindu.co.in

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