Research Notes 67 Full-title bibliography: cookery and household affairs books published in Britain 1800-1914 Lynette Hunter Department of English, University of Wales Institute of Science and Technology, Cardiff, U.K. This bibliographic project has grown from a sugges- tion by Alan Davidson who organised a symposium on cookery books at St. Antony's College, Oxford in May 1980. The topics covered by the symposium neatly indicate the different interests involved: papers were presented on the history of cookery and the books about that cookery from Roman antiquity to the medieval Arab countries, early Renaissance Europe and nineteenth-century England. Associated with the topics were dis- cussions on the supply and demand of foodstuffs, the growth of the restaurant trade, and the practical applicability of cookery books to the modern cater- er or chef. During the symposium, Prospect Books announced that it would be publishing Virginia MacLean's bibliography of eighteenth-century English language cookery books*. This inspired such response from the varied audience that it was thought that a nineteenth-century project would be of considerable use, especially considering the in- adequate nature of similar works in the area. Since then I have put together a team of four people from different backgrounds in professional bibli- ography, book design and production, and re- search into social history, education and literary texts -- but all with an overriding serious interest in cookery, gastronomy and household affairs. The project itself is of enormous proportions mainly due to the quantity of books published following the revolution in printing techniques that occurred during the 1830s. We have confined ourselves to books published in Britain and the resulting work will occupy three volumes. The first of these will comprise cookery books 1800-1874, the second cookery books 1875-1914 and the third books of household affairs 1800-1914. The volumes on cookery will include works on gastron- omy, gastrosophy and related works such as guides to restaurants. An example of the latter would be: The American stranger's guide to London and Liverpool at table. How to dine and order a dinner; and where to avoid dining, with practical hints to butlers and cooks. *Now available from: Prospect Books, 45 Lamont Rd, London SWl0 OH4. 'Household affairs' covers the subjects of domestic service, housework, household utensils, family and household management and etiquette. Related areas such as husbandry will enter only when they clearly overlap with duties within the house, or in the case of certain classic texts such as Cobbett's Cottage Economy whose influence pervades many later household manuals. The bibliography is aimed at a varied audience from collectors and book dealers, to researchers into sociology, education and history, and to any- one with a more general interest in these topics. The period 1800-1914 saw the rise and fall not only of the British Empire but also that of the industrial state, the middle classes and the army of domestic servants. The changes in the lives of the average man or woman are illustrated with detail and often more pertinently than in contemporary com- mentaries on the 'state of the nation', in the manu- als of etiquette and the instructions to household duties and advice on marketing, found in the domestic and vocational books of the period. Social and educational changes during the nineteenth century greatly affected the appearance and role of these books, as did the printing revol- ution. Not only the quantity and quality of the initial works altered but the sheer number of edi- tions led to countless textual variants which docu- ment the shifting minutiae of daily life. The ease, and the relatively low cost of book production after 1840 facilitated the education of large numbers of people, and the growth of vocational schools in catering, cookery and domestic service dates from this period. In turn, different classes of writer found their voices and different audiences made their demands. Books, daily papers and, increasingly, manu- facturers' advertisements changed and changed along with the society. They document the careers of famous club chefs such as A. Soyer of the Re- form Club. His books The Gastronomic Regener- ator, The Modern Housewife or Menagere and Shilling Cookery for the People, established a tra- dition of separate instructions for the chef to the rich, the middle-class housewife and the poor, that underlines the Victorian concern with class hier- archies and responsible philanthropy. The increasing scientific interest in diet yields books on vegetarianism, on the preparation of foods for the sick or for children, as well as special- ist discussions on the chemistry and physics of cooking and eating. Science and technology in- vaded diet in far more substantial ways with the introduction of goods such as baking powder, the techniques for canning and preserving and the ad- vent of gas and electricity. Int. J. Hospitality Management Vol. 1 No, 1 pp. 67-681982 0276-4319/82/010067-02503.0010 Printed in Great Britain (~1982 Pergamon Press Ltd