Summary Of Consider The Lobster

Foster Wallace’s article “Consider the Lobster” was published in Gourmet magazine, and is about the cruelties involved in eating lobster that many people consider elegant. Wallace starts off in this article by discussing the 56th Annual Maine Lobster Festival where over 25,000 pounds of fresh-caught lobster were eaten, and cooking competition were also available. In this article, Wallace discusses everything from how the lobster is caught, stored, and the cruel method in which these lobsters are cooked and finally consumed and also defined what lobster is by saying it’s a giant sea-insect. Furthermore, Wallace goes on to explain the history behind lobsters. The author said in the early 1800’s, lobsters were literally low-class food eaten by the poor and institutionalized but now, lobsters are seen as delicacies and eaten by everyone. Then the author begins to question why premodern lobster were often cooked dead and preserved usually in salt or crude enclosed containers. Wallace went on to mention how lobster is basically a summer food because summer is lobster’s molting season and they tend to be most trappable at summer because of the temperature. The author also said lobster can be boiled, baked, steamed, grilled, microwaved, and broiled; but boiling is the easiest.

The author also said lobsters require no cleaning or plucking, but are relatively easy for sellers to keep alive. Wallace then begins to question if it is right for lobsters to be boiled just for human tasting pleasure. He then said his own opinion that lobsters are extremely sensitive and shouldn’t be eaten. Wallace also discusses how some people say that because lobster have no cerebral cortex-the area of the brain that gives the experience of pain, they feel no