richard-in-cincy
Well-known member
Sorry for this being so late; it's been a trying month here...
Review: “The United States of Arugula” by David Kamp
By Richard Young
I was really looking forward to reading this book. The praises on the dust jacket promised lots of “dish” and inside scoop on the development of the raging US obsession of upscale dining and cookery (but note that the people writing these praises weren’t slammed in the book as many others, living and dead, were by this author). What I found was a lot of outrageous quotes and anecdotes that, more often than not, were not attributable to any source. As someone who comes from a publishing house background, this was a serious bibliographic error for me. I was frankly surprised that it was released this way.
There is a bibliography where I suppose all the non-attributed quotes were derived from. But how is the casual reader supposed to know that, or indeed, take the considerable amount of time that it would require to verify the non-attributed quotes? That’s not a reader’s job; it is the author’s job to substantiate his writing so that his facts are correct, documented, and provable.
Unfortunately for this book, Mr. Kemp failed to do this. Further, the bibliography is just an alphabetic list of source material. There are no chapter by chapter references, nor are there cross references to sources when a quote is used. The reader is left with the situation of either taking the author’s word that what is on the page is accurate or not believing the author. I’m certain there is a lot of truth in the book, but I was frequently skeptical of quotes and statements used by the author.
Another problem with the slipshod housekeeping in this book is in the introduction to the bibliography, where the author states, “I’ve only included the longer and more heavily leaned-upon articles in this bibliography.” I can only interpret this as, “not every quote in this book has a verifiable source.” Ouch. I suspect, on the other hand, that the author would have us assume every word is accurate as represented.
The above mentioned problems, coupled with numerous minor errors here and there throughout the book (place names, word usages, incredibly distasteful and condescending attempts at phonetic spellings of dialects, etc.), left me thinking "why am I supposed to believe this is true?" if the quote is not attributed, or that "so-and-so" actually said something when even common public domain knowledge contains noticeable errors.
Without the documentation to prove authenticity and the numerous errors in the text, I was left with the only choice of not believing the author.
The author also uses heavy and loaded adjectives that seemed to me to state his own prejudices, some of which were rather annoying and uncalled for. He describes Celestial Seasonings “Raspberry Zinger” tea as a “trippy blend.” Why? Does it include hallucinogenic ingredients? Did someone call it this? I wouldn’t know since the author didn’t attribute the phrase to anyone so again, I have to assume those are the author’s words and opinions.
Since there are few attributions to verify facts, it often seemed that statements were the author's opinion even though they are stated as fact. For instance, in discussing the homosexuality of Beard and Claiborne, the author begins writing with a disinterested third-party voice, but then begins to add very unflattering and anti-gay turns of phrase that are solely coming from the author, since they aren't part of quotes, such as: “As unlikely a man in uniform as Beard was, he had some competition in the navy’s Craig Claiborne, yeoman, third class. Claiborne was a troubled soul, a queer (!), squinty-eyed kid from Indianola, MS, with a set of psycho-sexual complexes worthy of a Tennessee Williams character.” Or, “(Beard) addressing the young chef as ‘darling’ and ‘my dear’ in the swishy manner…” There are no attributable quotes on these passages nor any bibliographic reference to any source, so the reader can only assume this is the author’s homophobic opinion glistening repugnantly in his manuscript. I tried to give the author the benefit of the doubt, thinking he may have been using gay slang and phrases as an “insider,” but if that was indeed his intent, it failed miserably for me. I found most of these passages condescending, insulting, and in extremely bad taste. So much so, that I was greatly put off by them in the end.
I assume the vast majority of the material is somewhat accurate, or based upon a factual incident. However, many times even the references to factual incidents vary significantly from the person’s own account when contrasted with this author’s loaded and slanted language. For example: The author states that Julia Child was “assigned” to a cooking course at Cordon Bleu and “agitated” to get out of the program. According to Julia Child’s autobiography, Ms. Child signed up for a course, went to the first class, did not care for it, and switched to another course. The author inflects a very different, and derogatory, meaning by his choice of words (Indeed, many of his references to Ms. Child seemed petty, demeaning, and uncalled for).
While it started out with promises of fun and lots of outrageous "dish" that you don't get in other books, the above mentioned problems weighed heavily in my mind as I read this book. I did not trust Mr. Kemp as a reliable source to present the information and the history contained in the book. I found myself plowing through this book in a constant state of irritation since I had committed to reading it and writing a review. If I had picked this book up at the library, I would have quit reading after a couple dozen pages and returned it unread.
Review: “The United States of Arugula” by David Kamp
By Richard Young
I was really looking forward to reading this book. The praises on the dust jacket promised lots of “dish” and inside scoop on the development of the raging US obsession of upscale dining and cookery (but note that the people writing these praises weren’t slammed in the book as many others, living and dead, were by this author). What I found was a lot of outrageous quotes and anecdotes that, more often than not, were not attributable to any source. As someone who comes from a publishing house background, this was a serious bibliographic error for me. I was frankly surprised that it was released this way.
There is a bibliography where I suppose all the non-attributed quotes were derived from. But how is the casual reader supposed to know that, or indeed, take the considerable amount of time that it would require to verify the non-attributed quotes? That’s not a reader’s job; it is the author’s job to substantiate his writing so that his facts are correct, documented, and provable.
Unfortunately for this book, Mr. Kemp failed to do this. Further, the bibliography is just an alphabetic list of source material. There are no chapter by chapter references, nor are there cross references to sources when a quote is used. The reader is left with the situation of either taking the author’s word that what is on the page is accurate or not believing the author. I’m certain there is a lot of truth in the book, but I was frequently skeptical of quotes and statements used by the author.
Another problem with the slipshod housekeeping in this book is in the introduction to the bibliography, where the author states, “I’ve only included the longer and more heavily leaned-upon articles in this bibliography.” I can only interpret this as, “not every quote in this book has a verifiable source.” Ouch. I suspect, on the other hand, that the author would have us assume every word is accurate as represented.
The above mentioned problems, coupled with numerous minor errors here and there throughout the book (place names, word usages, incredibly distasteful and condescending attempts at phonetic spellings of dialects, etc.), left me thinking "why am I supposed to believe this is true?" if the quote is not attributed, or that "so-and-so" actually said something when even common public domain knowledge contains noticeable errors.
Without the documentation to prove authenticity and the numerous errors in the text, I was left with the only choice of not believing the author.
The author also uses heavy and loaded adjectives that seemed to me to state his own prejudices, some of which were rather annoying and uncalled for. He describes Celestial Seasonings “Raspberry Zinger” tea as a “trippy blend.” Why? Does it include hallucinogenic ingredients? Did someone call it this? I wouldn’t know since the author didn’t attribute the phrase to anyone so again, I have to assume those are the author’s words and opinions.
Since there are few attributions to verify facts, it often seemed that statements were the author's opinion even though they are stated as fact. For instance, in discussing the homosexuality of Beard and Claiborne, the author begins writing with a disinterested third-party voice, but then begins to add very unflattering and anti-gay turns of phrase that are solely coming from the author, since they aren't part of quotes, such as: “As unlikely a man in uniform as Beard was, he had some competition in the navy’s Craig Claiborne, yeoman, third class. Claiborne was a troubled soul, a queer (!), squinty-eyed kid from Indianola, MS, with a set of psycho-sexual complexes worthy of a Tennessee Williams character.” Or, “(Beard) addressing the young chef as ‘darling’ and ‘my dear’ in the swishy manner…” There are no attributable quotes on these passages nor any bibliographic reference to any source, so the reader can only assume this is the author’s homophobic opinion glistening repugnantly in his manuscript. I tried to give the author the benefit of the doubt, thinking he may have been using gay slang and phrases as an “insider,” but if that was indeed his intent, it failed miserably for me. I found most of these passages condescending, insulting, and in extremely bad taste. So much so, that I was greatly put off by them in the end.
I assume the vast majority of the material is somewhat accurate, or based upon a factual incident. However, many times even the references to factual incidents vary significantly from the person’s own account when contrasted with this author’s loaded and slanted language. For example: The author states that Julia Child was “assigned” to a cooking course at Cordon Bleu and “agitated” to get out of the program. According to Julia Child’s autobiography, Ms. Child signed up for a course, went to the first class, did not care for it, and switched to another course. The author inflects a very different, and derogatory, meaning by his choice of words (Indeed, many of his references to Ms. Child seemed petty, demeaning, and uncalled for).
While it started out with promises of fun and lots of outrageous "dish" that you don't get in other books, the above mentioned problems weighed heavily in my mind as I read this book. I did not trust Mr. Kemp as a reliable source to present the information and the history contained in the book. I found myself plowing through this book in a constant state of irritation since I had committed to reading it and writing a review. If I had picked this book up at the library, I would have quit reading after a couple dozen pages and returned it unread.