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COOPER, ARTEMIS: : Writing at the Kitchen Table: THE AUTHORIZED BOGRAPHY OF ELIZABETH DAVID

LONDON.MICHAEL JOSEPH,1999.

ISBN 0718142241.

UK,8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn.NFINE/NFINE.No owner inscrptn and no price-clip to dw/dj. Bright,crisp,clean,sepia subject portrait photographic illustrated dw/dj; with negligible shelf-wear and creasing to edges and corners - no major nicks or tears present.Top edges lightly dust- soiled but still bright,fore-edges bright and clean; contents bright,tight and near pristine - no dog-ear reading creases to any pages' corners - possibly unread? Bright,clean,sharp-cornered,publisher's original,plain black cloth bds with bright,crisp,stamped gilt letters to spine /backstrip,coloured headband,and immaculate speckled grey eps.UK,8vo HB+ dw/dj,1st edn,vi-xixpp+1-363pp [paginated] includes illus list/table,intro+ acknowledgements,21 chapters,epilogue,16pp in 2 blocks of 8pp apiece between pp108/9 and pp236/7 respectively,of subject, contemporary biographical b/w photographs, notes and sources,a select biblio and an index.Plus [unpaginated] half-title+title pages,contents list/table,double-page genealogical family tree showing the Gwynnes,Ridleys,Majoribanks,Hoggs and Palmers. While still a girl,Elizabeth Gwynne longed to escape from the horsey,country- house world in which she was brought up. After being 'finished' in Paris and Munich,she went on the stage,but she was restless and unsettled. In August 1939 she and her lover,Charles Gibson-Cowan,set off in a boat for Greece. Trapped in Antibes by the war,Elizabeth came under the spell of Norman Douglas,one of the most important influences in her life.She and Charles set sail again just as Italy entered the war,only to find themselves interned. Eventually they reached Athens.They spent the winter of 1940-41 on a Greek island, where Elizabeth first started to cook Mediterranean food. The German invasion of the Balkans forced them to join the refugees fleeing to Egypt.In the raffish 'Fortunes of War' world of Alexandria and Cairo,Elizabeth flourished and came to know writers such as Lawrence Durrell and Patrick Leigh Fermor.She also met Tony David,an officer in the Indian army. He proposed to her by letter from Italy and,to the astonishment of her friends,she accepted.After the war and a few months in India,Elizabeth returned to grey and rationed England. Exasperated by the bleakness of English food,she put pen to paper and began to work out 'an agonized craving for the sun'.The result was 'Mediterranean Food',a book which caught the imagination of a generation.In the course of the next decade,the happiest of her life,her books and articles inspired a cookery revolution. Elizabeth never spoke of her failed marriage,and few people knew about the other man,the great love of her life.When he left her for another woman,she thought she would never write again.Instead she opened her kitchen shop,but disagreements between the partners forced Elizabeth out. She returned to writing,but the tone of her last books was more scholarly than lyrical. Working from an extensive archive of personal papers,Artemis Cooper reveals the powerful tensions between Elizabeth David's private world and the image of the successful woman she presented to her public.It is a story that even some of her closest friends never knew. Since April 2013,again in March 2015,and in this year too,the UK Post Office has altered it's Pricing in Proportion template,altering its weight allowances, dimensions and lowered its compensation rates too! So,please contact seller,because of the weight and value of this item,for correct, insured shipping/P+p quotes - particularly ALL overseas buyers - BEFORE ordering through the order page!

UK,8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn.
Not SIGNED.

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