Dubious Honors [Paperback]

M. F. K. Fisher (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1990

Focusing on subjects as varied as the Gare de Lyon, Japanese cooking, her father, California wine, living in Burgundy, Maurice Chevalier, marriage, and aging, these twenty essays constitute a beguiling "commonplace book" of M.F.K. Fisher's observations on life, art, travel, food, and drink.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Fisher, of whom it was once said that she writes about food the way that others write about love, is probably the most esteemed food writer in America. Here she collects 35 prefaces15 written for her own books, the rest for cookbooks and other books about food and drink by other writers, each of the latter introduced by a short new essay. Some of the prefaces are rich and meaty, like the small masterwork that introduces the memorial edition of The Alice B. Toklas Cookbook ; some are very slight. The only point in reprinting them is to gather in one place the perceptions, insights, and autobiographical fragments that enrich almost every sentence Fisher writes. She is always worth reading, but this is a minor addition to the canon. Ruth Diebold, M.L.S., Upper Nyack,
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Despite its self-effacing title, Dubious Honors shows one of America's finest and most esteemed writers about food at her reliable best. This is a beguiling collection.... Dubious Honors cuts yet another sparkling facet in the gemlike prose of M.F.K. Fisher's lustrous career." -- New York Times Book Review

"Dubious Honors provides devotees with new stories and fond memories, newcomers with an introduction to this remarkable writer's oeuvre." -- The Baltimore Sun

"Fisher's essence is love of food and love of other lovers of food, and that comes through clearly and delightfully." -- Philadelphia Inquirer

"M.F.K. Fisher ... brings onstage a peach or a brace of quail and shows us history, cities, fantasies, memories, emotions." -- Patricia Storace, The New York Review of Books

"M.F.K. Fisher is our greatest food writer because she puts food in the mount, the mind and the imagination all at the same time. Beyond the gastronomical bravura, she is a passionate woman; food is her metaphor." -- Shana Alexander

"Mrs. Fisher speaks her mind, and never stops applying high standards of judgment to the books she is ostensibly recommending." -- Wall Street Journal

"Poet of the appetites." -- John Updike

"She writes about fleeting tastes and feasts vividly, excitingly, sensuously, exquisitely. There is almost a wicked thrill in following her uninhibited track through the glories of the good life." -- James Beard

"She writes about food as others do about love, but rather better." -- Clifton Fadiman

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 212 pages
• Publisher: North Point Pr (April 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0865474141
• ISBN-13: 978-0865474147
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 0.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,251,980 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Dubious manuscript, January 25, 2008

By 

Patrick W. Crabtree "The Old Grottomaster" (Lucasville, OH USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dubious Honors (Paperback)

I originally bought this volume (at a used book store for a buck) because I had yet to read any M.F.K. Fisher, a huge gap in my culinary literacy. I didn't notice at the time that the content was a series of Introductions, Prefaces, and Forewords to other books, mostly culinary titles. Some of these writings were published in the books of others and a few were generated for her own works.

I have been on close terms with a large number of various types of celebrities, (some small-time, some renowned worldwide), over the course of my lifetime and there is something about most of them, however "nice" they might be, that is purely superficial (one major exception I know of to this rule is the great Harry Carey, Jr., a VERY nice and genuine man). My point in saying this is that, having now read "Dubious Honors," I did not leave the work with a warm and fuzzy feeling about M.F.K. Fisher.

The reader will discover that most of the entries are "nostalgic" and more about M.F.K. Fisher than the book which she was introducing. She also always mentions money, ("paid" or "unpaid"), one way or another, (in her "Introductions" to her "Introductions"), and the perceptive reader can detect her genuine [unwritten] feeling about such remuneration, or the lack thereof, in each instance. I really felt that these comments did not contribute positively, or at all, to the book.

Fisher died in 1992 at the ripe old age of 83 -- this was one of her later publications (1988) and, in all honesty, appears to be a milking of previous work just for one more "tick," to quote an English birdwatching term. While she wants you to believe that she wrote these, mostly kind, words either for good friends who deserved her praise, or for truly great literary efforts, I still garnered a feeling of the mercenary which she must have unconsciously conveyed in her writing.

One could easily say that M.F.K. Fisher was a controversial figure so I was certainly expecting some level of outrageousness in her comments. I found about what I had expected in that realm but I also picked up enough "drift" to come away thinking that Ms. Fisher may have been a sort of a [...] on some level. I don't cite that term with any mendacious or degrading motives -- I just mean it to clearly convey, for example, that when she got invited to social functions, I'll wager that it was more likely to fulfill "a social void" rather than to have her around for her bubbly personality.

"Dubious Honors," aside from the title, is an ego work. I did find it easy to read and interesting as well, albeit, I didn't actually learn much of use to me from the text. Fans of M.F.K. Fisher should think of this work as heavily autobiographical and will probably discover that it is much to their liking. There is some culinary interest, especially as it applies to the publication of cookbooks -- I think one could glean out some good advice from the text in that singular, obscure realm. Most casual readers, however, should probably pass this one by.