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Hotel Bemelmans
  • Published: 2 December 2002
  • ISBN: 9780091887872
  • Imprint: Ebury Press
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 320
  • RRP: $35.00

Hotel Bemelmans

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Humorous and generous tales of kitchen life behind the scenes at the Ritz in 1920s and 1930s New York

If there is such a thing as a comfort food book, Bemelmans' stories are it. His evocative tales of grand hotel life have a reporter's eye for sensory detail, yet he always manages to bathe his world and it's lovable characters in the mood of a fairytale. Meet the girl-hungry hotel Magician, Kalakobe the African cook, Mr Sigsag, Monsieur Victor, Mespoulet and an unforgettable cast of down but not yet out hotel employees. A feast of food writing. And once you've read one Bemelmans' tale you fall in love and want to read the lot.
  • Published: 2 December 2002
  • ISBN: 9780091887872
  • Imprint: Ebury Press
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 320
  • RRP: $35.00
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About the author

Ludwig Bemelmans

Ludwig Bemelmans was a painter, illustrator, and writer for both children and adults. A world traveler, he spent most of his time in New York City or Paris. The original inspiration for Madeline was the result of his bicycle accident on an island of France. Hospitalized after being hit by the only car on the island, Mr. Bemelmans recalled, “The sisters in that small hospital wore large, starched white hats that looked like the wings of a giant butterfly. In the room next to mine was a little girl who had had her appendix out. In the ceiling over my bed was a crack ‘that had the habit of sometimes looking like a rabbit.’” A year later, back in New York City, he penned the first draft of Madeline on the backs of menus in Pete’s Tavern. The Madeline books rank among the most-honored children’s books series. Madeline was named a Caldecott Honor Book and the first of its five sequels, Madeline’s Rescue, won the Caldecott Medal and was a New York Times Outstanding Book of the Year. Mr. Bemelmans died in 1962, after completing Madeline’s Christmas.
LB

Also by Ludwig Bemelmans

Madeline and the Gypsies
Madeline
Madeline's ABCs
Madeline in London
Madeline Says Be Kind
Madeline's Seasons
Madeline's 123
See all

Praise for Hotel Bemelmans

The adventures of the original bad boy of the New York restaurant/ hotel underbelly continue. Whether writing about the backstairs misadventures of cooks and waiters or travel to faraway lands, Bemelmans is always funny, insightful and dead on target. No one has ever surpassed the master.

Anthony Bourdain

A complete original

Saturday Review

An artist in both line and words ... with talents of gold

Observer

Very entertaining ... an excellent story-teller

Sunday Times

One reads Bemelmans not as one reads a serious novelist but for the sheer momentary pleasure given by his evocation of atmosphere and mood

Punch

A note of expensive cosmopolitan is brilliantly sustained. There are stories here that could hardly be done better

New Statesman

The singularity of Bemelmans, whether he draws or writes, is his double capacity to see freshly like a child and comment shrewdly like a grown up. The product is an awry wisdom, the wisdom of a reflective innocent who is surprised at nothing and delighted with everything

Clifton Fadiman

Mr Bemelmans is always pricking bubbles, discreetly, appreciatively, out of a sense of duty rather than a desire to shock, and the process is delightful

The Times