Proust's coffee

Marcel Proust's housekeeper Céleste Albaret recounts preparing the boss's coffee:

It was a ritual. First, only Corcellet coffee could be used, and it had to be bought at a shop in rue de Lévis in the seventeenth arrondissement where it was roasted, to make sure it was fresh and had lost none of its aroma. The filter, too, had to be Corcellet. Even the little tray was from Corcellet.

Céleste Albaret, Monsieur Proust, translated by Barbara Bray (New York: New York Review Books, 2003), 22.

The Corcellet family opened une épicerie fine, a fine-foods store, a delicatessen, in Paris in 1787. As late as 1983, there was a Corcellet (Paul) roasting coffee at his Parisian store. Céline de Pierredon-Corcellet, Paul's daughter, now runs SOPROVAL (Société Provençale d'Alimentation de Luxe) in Provence, producing mustards, oils, spices, and vinegars. No coffee alas.

A trip to Google Book Search suggests that Proust was hardly unusual in his devotion to Corcellet coffee:

From Galignani's New Paris Guide, for 1852: Compiled from the Best Authorities, Revised and Verified by Personal Inspection, and Arranged on an Entirely New Plan (Paris: A. and W. Galignani, 1852), 594.

*

June 2: Now there's more on Proust's coffee.

Related reading
Paul Corcollet (1910–1993) (The Independent)
SOPROVAL (company history)
Proust's letters to Céleste Albaret at auction (with coffee stains)
All Proust posts (via Pinboard)

Real housewives fifth-graders

From The Real Housewives of New York City, Kelly Killoren Bensimon speaking:

"Maybe he's an imaginary boyfriend to you, but he's not an imaginary boyfriend to me!"

This show makes better sense if you think of the cast as fifth-graders. "You think you're better than me!" Et cetera.

Benny Goodman's 100th

"Hollywood Hotel, good morning. Benny Goodman? I'm sorry, but he's rehearsing in the Orchid Room and can't be disturbed."



Benjamin David Goodman was born 100 years ago today.

John McDonough, How Benny Goodman Won Over America (NPR)
Robert McHenry, Benny Goodman @ 100 (Britannica Blog)
Tom Vitale, Benny Goodman: Forever The King Of Swing (NPR)

The Benny Goodman Orchestra and Quartet: clips from Hollywood Hotel (dir. Busby Berkeley, 1937): "Sing, Sing, Sing" (Louis Prima) and "I've Got a Heartful of Music" (Richard A. Whiting–Johnny Mercer). With Harry James (trumpet), Teddy Wilson (piano), Lionel Hampton (vibraphone), Gene Krupa (drums) (via Dailymotion).

[Photograph from New York World's Fair records, 1939-1940, via the NYPL Digital Gallery.]

"So cheap, so accessible"

Charles McGrath tries the Kindle:

Books for the Kindle are so cheap and so accessible, turning up on your device within seconds, that you wind up buying them impulsively and almost indiscriminately.

One evening my wife wanted to check a passage from Dombey and Son, which she had been listening to in the car. Ninety-nine cents, a typed-in phrase and, bingo, there it was.

By-the-Book Reader Meets the Kindle (New York Times)

That's great for Amazon. And for Mrs. McGrath, of course. I've used Google Book Search many times to check a sentence or passage. But when a novel becomes almost disposable, something one can buy for one-off use (like a cheap hat or umbrella), I worry that what's happened to music is now happening to books.

The comments on this article are worth reading too.

A related post
No Kindle for me

David Barringer on books

Graphic designer and writer David Barringer, interviewed by Ellen Lupton:

Some people argue that books are becoming more like art objects, released from the pressure to convey a narrative and liberated into the world of wacky dimensionality. Sure, it would be fun to attach half a beach ball on the front cover, the other half on the back cover, and inflate them both for the ultimate beach book. But I've seen many friends who are avid readers turn toward their shelves of books and regard them as they would a photo album of their own lives. We take the contents of books into our imaginations, and our personalities are influenced by them. Looking at the books on my shelves, I feel memories bloom, my own life come back to me. Books are triggers for remembering where we have been, and who we are. A book is like a body part, and when you die and your connection to the book is broken, the book dies a little, too.

A Conversation With David Barringer (Design Observer)

My Dinner with André: Criterion DVD

"I think if you could become fully aware of what existed in the cigar store next door to this restaurant, I think it would just blow your brains out."

At last: My Dinner with André (dir. Louis Malle, 1981) will be released on June 23 in a Criterion Collection edition. I've been waiting for this one for years.

"Proud non-reader"

Sometimes people write novels and they just be so wordy and so self-absorbed. I am not a fan of books. I would never want a book's autograph. I am a proud non-reader of books.

Kanye West, on the occasion of his first book, Thank You and You're Welcome. Further ironies via the link:

"Proud non-reader" Kanye West turns author (Reuters)

And if there's any doubt: Snopes confirms the authenticity of the quotation.

(Thanks, Rachel!)

When comics collide

[Mark Trail and one panel of Hi and Lois, May 27, 2009.]

I read Mark Trail only occasionally. I'm glad that I read Mark Trail today. Click the image for a larger view and see why.

Related reading
All Hi and Lois posts
Online comics

Erin McKean talks

"Why isn't asshat in the dictionary?"

Lexicographer Erin McKean talks about how dictionaries are made:

Erin McKean at Gel 2006 (19:30)

(via Good Experience)

Blogging and introversion

Jonathan Rauch:

I suspect a lot of bloggers may be introverts, because blogging is great if you like to sit in front of the internet all day.

Eight questions for Jonathan Rauch (Economist)

Hmm.

Jonathan Rauch is the author of the celebrated Atlantic article Caring for Your Introvert.