Book excerpt: This book is a concise history of smoking in British popular culture from the early 19th century to the present day. It explores the culture of the pipe and the cigar in the 19th century, the role of the cigarette in the mass market economy of the early 20th century, and the politics of smoking and health since the 1950s. Combining a wide range of historical sources with examples drawn from film and popular literature, it provides a comprehensive social, cultural, and economic history of smoking.