Over the River and through the woods, to Irving St. we go?

I guess you have to move back catalog, and I guess it's harder with a dead cookbook author than with a dead rapper, b/c you can't release posthumous duets and stuff, but still, kind of a weird move from Knopf:

Yep, that's a banner advertisement on the online version of DI/DO suggesting that the answer to your Thanksgiving agit is... Julia Child? This is not quite like having Martin Luther celebrate Mass, but it's a headscratcher. Child dropped one (2 volume) cookbook that changed everything, and had a TV career that was even more infulential. TV chefs have to publish cookbooks b/c people want to buy them. Her bibliography reveals some essential titles, and some far less so. If Julia Child is the Wu-Tang Clan, then Mastering the Art of French Cooking is clearly her 36 Chambers, but there are some titles in the list that are more akin to Raekwon solo joints. The Way to Cook may be more of an Iron Flag, but I've never felt obliged to pick it up, what with a shelf full of books covering similar generalist territory. 

So, yeah, "Traditional roast turkey" is sort of the opposite of what MTAOFC was all about, but curiouser still, the livery of the Knopf advertisement, steering people toward Julia's Way to Cook, is the iconic fleur-de-lys and whatchamajig of MTAOFC. 

I have been thinking about icons and the wonkiness of our affective attachments to them at my day job, and this feels sort of similar. Anxious thanksgiving hosts fly to the pages of DI/DO in search of succor, and see the familiar face of Julia Child, click, and feel better. I would be sorry if this became a thing, as it works to reduce Julia to something like a posthumous career as a soigne 1-800-BUTTERBALL hotline. The essence of Julia's achievement was that she challenged home cooks, even as she made them feel they were up to the challenge. Situating Julia as the answer to Thanksgiving agit makes her more akin to a culinary Xanax, which is a shame. 

Comments

[Warren Bobrow]

I miss Julia. But not as much as I miss Clementine Paddleford who was the first American food writer from the 1920's to the 1960's. She piloted her own Piper Cub all over America seeking real food. This was way before foodies took over the Food Network.
Julia Child owned a home off Bass Harbor in Down East Maine. (my family owns a home on Swan's Island) The ferry for Swan's Island goes right past the home that Julia Child spent her summers. She would stare off at the ferries, waving at the summer folks and the fishermen as the ferry strained against the tide. I chose to remember her waving as we went out to sea. A lovely memory.