OP: The Table and Love - Elegant Dining Table for Romantic Dinners, Family Gatherings & Home Decor

Product Description

Le Cle d’Or, 1950. Paperback. Good.

Maurice Edmond Sailland (1872–1956), most recognizable by his pen name, Curnonsky, was a major figure in the world of French gastronomy before WWII. He published, with Marcel Rouff, a popular series of regional guides to dining throughout France, wrote or ghost wrote a number of cookbooks and newspaper articles, and was a member of any dining club he could join. Of the unapologetic gourmand, Samuel Chamberlain said, “He ascribed his robust good health to a reasonable indulgence in all excesses and a nonchalant scorn of all sports.”

After such an exuberant embrace of one of life’s corporeal pleasures, it is no surprise that another might also follow. La Table et l’Amour (1950) was Curnonsky’s contribution to the literature on aphrodisiacs. Not without a sense of humor and irony, he blends chatty history with statements on the amorous qualities of various ingredients and recipes for those dishes sure to stimulate appetites. He ends the preface saying, “Knowing how to eat, knowing how to drink, knowing how to love, this is the happy sharing of a chosen few. May this little book increase the number.”

Our copy is designated as Good only, most notably because it seems the page edges were originally left unopened by the publishers. A previous owner hastily opened (most of) them leaving many jagged edges and one repair with clear tape. Otherwise, soiling to the wrappers and missing paper from the foot of the spine. The binding remains sound. Paperback. In French.