Educating Alice: Adventures of a Curious Woman (Hardcover)

~ (Author) "A LIGHT SNOW was falling as I left my hotel and hurried across the narrow rue Cambon to the employees' entrance of the Hotel Ritz..." (more)
Key Phrases: retired geisha, apprentice geisha, thinking voice, Jane Austen, Borgo Pinti, Father Domenico (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Steinbach had so much fun running off to Europe to find herself, as recounted in her first book (Without Reservations), she decided to quit her job writing for the Baltimore Sun and devote herself to similar educational adventures. Following the advice of Japanese poet Basho ("To learn of the pine, go to the pine"), Steinbach takes off again and recounts eight endeavors, including studying French cooking in Paris, attending a Jane Austen convention in England and meeting geishas in Kyoto. She captures the uniqueness of each setting, aided by a sharply curious sensibility she claims stems as much from her childhood admiration for Nancy Drew as from her reportorial training. That spirit of openness also enables her to strike up many spontaneous conversations easily, frequently launching other discoveries. A search for a bonsai garden in Florence, for example, winds up becoming a tour of several palaces normally closed to the public, which leads to an old priest's tale of rescuing priceless paintings from a flood. Yet for all Steinbach's attention to others, her account remains resolutely personal, as her experiences unleash bittersweet childhood memories, and an ambiguously romantic relationship with a Japanese gentleman is never far from her thoughts. Her stories are powerfully seductive to anyone who's ever been tempted to get up and go, following interests wherever they may lead. Even during the occasional setbacks, from language barriers to confusing geographies, Steinbach makes such a life look highly desirable.
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From Booklist

After winning the Pulitzer Prize for journalism, Steinbach transformed herself into a travel writer and gained a readership with Without Reservations (2000). She now presents another blithe chronicle of sophisticated adventures as she returns to the humbling role of student in order to sample different creative pursuits. Steinbach goes to Paris to take cooking classes at the Hotel Ritz and to Kyoto, where she takes lessons in traditional arts and meets some truly remarkable women, including several geishas and an impressive entrepreneur. In England she makes pilgrimages to Jane Austen's residences, and in Havana she has some real fun, meeting artists and listening to great music. She tours private gardens in Provence, takes a writing workshop in Prague, and learns a bit about Border collies at a Scottish sheep farm. Attentive and receptive out in the world, on the page Steinbach is brisk, funny, confiding, and informative as she offers pithy observations, vivid profiles, and arcane facts. Experiencing her pleasurable sojourns vicariously, Steinbach's readers enjoy a virtual vacation from reality. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Random House; 1st edition edition (April 6, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375504419
• ISBN-13: 978-0375504419
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.4 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #889,263 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Seeing the world one class at a time, June 29, 2004

By	Celia Redmore "Celia Redmore" - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Alice Steinach loves traveling, loves writing, and loves learning. So she wrote her own job description and spent a year taking different classes around the world from French cuisine to Scottish sheepdog handling. The result is "Educating Alice", a trip around our planet without jetlag. There are eight chapters, one for each class.

Cookin' at the Ritz: Every woman has dreamed of taking a course in cooking at the Hotel Ritz in Paris. Alice Steinbach actually had the courage to do it. It's absolutely fascinating to be able to see inside the Ritz's kitchens without having to worry that Chef will raise his eyebrows if your mushrooms aren't sliced perfectly.

Dancing in Kyoto: The only way to find out why girls really become geishas is to take a dance lesson from one as Steinbach did. Apparently, the geishas aren't too happy about Arthur Golden's ""Memoirs of a Geisha." Here are the real facts of a geisha's life.

The Mystery of the Old Florentine Church: Steinbach took as her special project investigating the terrible floods in 1966 that turned the narrow streets of Florence into raging rivers. Steinbach found the human story behind the statistics.

Sense and Sensible Shoes: If you're a Jane Austin fan, this chapter is for you. Steinbach visited Chawton House, near Winchester, England - the manor once owned by Jane's brother - along with an all-star guest list of Austin experts.

Havana Dreams: There's so much politics talked about Cuba that it was a relief to see the island as ordinary Cubans experience it. I have a new respect for these endlessly cheerful people thanks to Educating Alice.

The Secret Gardens: This chapter is for gardeners. Steinbach went on a tour of famous gardens in Provence, France. To the French, gardening is an art form and Provence offers the perfect climate for enthusiastic gardeners.

The Unreliable Narrator: This chapter was a new take on a class for writers. Steinbach signed up for a course in Prague, Czechoslovakia. This is another class where you need to be a good sport. Steinbach is one.

Lassie Come Home: If you've ever struggled to teach your dog to sit on command, Steinbach has a challenge for you: Take a course learning to control the Border collies that Scottish shepherds use to herd sheep. They are the most amazing dogs.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars With Reservations, September 11, 2005

By	takingadayoff "takingadayoff" (Las Vegas, Nevada) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Educating Alice: Adventures of a Curious Woman (Paperback)

After having enjoyed Steinbach's previous book, Without Reservations, I was eager to see what she has been up to in the past few years and if she and Naohiro are still an item. In Without Reservations, Steinbach tells the story of how she took a year off from her job, bought an apartment in Paris and fell in love. It is a story of risk and reward. It really happened, but Steinbach tells it like a story.

In Educating Alice, Steinbach has quit her newspaper job for good. The royalties from Without Reservations must be rolling in, because now she can afford to take classes at the Ritz cooking school in Paris, geisha school in Kyoto, and a tour of lovely gardens in Avignon. Not much risk here. There is nothing connecting the classes, other than that Steinbach is interested in the subjects.

The only thread that runs through the entire book besides Steinbach herself, is Naohiro, her lover from Without Reservations. But the relationship is established and both Alice and Naohiro seem content to leave it as it is. So there is no conflict or drama. If I hadn't known Naohiro from the previous book, I'm not sure I would have been interested in their romance, which is conducted in Educating Alice mostly through letters.

I did enjoy reading about Steinbach's adventures at the Ritz in Paris, the first and best chapter of Educating Alice. Her view of the Upstairs, Downstairs nature of the grand hotel and her descriptions of her classmates and the chef are entertaining. Her discovery of the Oltrarno section of Florence is pleasant, and the adventures she has in Havana are the liveliest of the bunch.

Steinbach says of the Prague creative writing workshop she attends in one chapter, that "I thought the use of fiction techniques might improve my work as a nonfiction writer." While the individual chapters of Educating Alice are told as short stories, it would have been rewarding if the chapters had been parts of a larger story, as well. She didn't need the writing workshop at all. She showed in Without Reservations that she has already mastered that technique.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Travel stories with no connection, October 22, 2004

By	J. Rosenberg "reggieroy" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I really enjoyed Steinbach's book, Without Reservations, so I decided to read this one. The first few adventures were well written, with lots of interesting details and personal observations, plus meetings with locals. I particularly enjoyed her not-the-usual tourist activities in Cuba.

I was impressed by her ability to enjoy the courses she took without giving lectures to the reader. But that changed when she went to see gardens in Provence. Boorrrinnnggg! I'm not a gardener and I barely made it through that chapter. The writer's workshop in Prague interested me as a person who's been to Prague and to U.S. workshops. But she didn't make friends with a single student, and frankly, I thought she was in way over her head as a journalist trying to write fiction. Her efforts to write about the Holocaust were persumptuous to say the least. I was deeply offended and skipped her italicized fiction.

The last chapter, about border collies in Scotland, was even more boorriingg than the gardens chapter. I simply could not read it, having read an entire book on the subject about ten years ago. Ugh.

I also agree with reviewers here who want to know how and why she chose her destinations. And who paid for them!! Luxury hotels and all.