Description

‘A meticulous and lavishly illustrated account of the food of the Bloomsbury set … summons up a lost world of meals on trays, milk puddings, gin slings and kedgeree’ Sunday Times

The Bloomsbury Group fostered a fresh, creative and vital way of living that encouraged debate and communication (‘only connect’), as often as not across the dining table. Gathered at these tables were many of the great figures in art, literature and economics in the early twentieth century: E. M. Forster, Roger Fry, J. M. Keynes, Lytton Strachey and Virginia Woolf, among many others. Here the Bloomsbury story is told in seven broadly chronological chapters, beginning in the 1890s and finishing in the very recent past. Each chapter comprises a series of narratives, many of which are enhanced with an appropriate recipe, along with sketches, paintings, photographs, letters and handwritten notes, and featuring original quotations throughout.

Part cookbook, part social and cultural history, this book will appeal to lovers of food and lovers of literature alike.

Publisher Review

'I need this book!' - Nigella Lawson 'A meticulous and lavishly illustrated account of the food of the Bloomsbury set ... summons up a lost world of meals on trays, milk puddings, gin slings and kedgeree' - Sunday Times 'An enticing blend of cultural and gastronomic history' - Times Literary Supplement 'Glorious ... a feast of eccentric detail' - New Statesman 'A window onto Bloomsbury via recipes, grocery lists, pantries, kitchens and, above all, dining tables' - Virginia Nicholson