The Sun and Moon Guide to Eating Through Literature

Gathers recipes, artwork featuring food, and selections that feature food and eating from essays, poems, fiction, and drama

Food and literature are likely counterparts: stories, novels, and poetry often contain descriptions of repasts and other alimentary tidbits. This work began as a collection of recipes contributed by famous authors but evolved instead into over 100 food-related excerpts and short writings taken from world literature. The authors include Gertrude Stein, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, August Strindberg, John Cage, Djuna Barnes, and Vaclav Havel. The book is divided into eight "courses," including "Reunions and Tea," "Entrees," and "Memories, Cigars, Liquors and Late Night Snacks." Many of the selections are delightful, such as a strange story by John Perreault entitled "The Big Cheese," but a few suffer from being excerpted out of context. The abundant illustrations are reproduced from fine-art works. Not an essential purchase but certainly appropriate for gastronomy and literature collections.
Janice Braun, Hoover Inst. Lib., Stanford, Cal.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.