As Julia Child and her friend Simca were both enjoy a temporary stay in Washington DC, they decided to visit their new publishing company, Houghton Mifflin. The girls are nowhere near being done, having only two sections completed (sauces and poultry), but they already had over 700 pages devoted to instructions and recipes. A few days after giving their manuscript to Houghton Mifflin, the chefs received back their manuscript back along with a letter. The letter said "...What we could envision as saleable...is perhaps a series of smaller books devoted to particular portions of the meal...certainly less elaborate that your present volumes, which, although we are sure that they are foolproof, are undeniably demanding in time and focus" (229). The American public, it seemed, was more interested in a quick, easy meal, than a nice, elaborate, home made one. At first Child and Simca wanted to abandon the company in search of one that would publish their entire book, but after much thought decided that it would be better to create a shorter book for the time being, then later publish their big book. They replied to the letter by saying: "Everything would be of the simpler sort...and emphasis would always be on how to prepare ahead, and how to reheat" (231). Even though it meant putting their dream cook book on hold, the women realized that there would not be a huge audience for their cookbook, especially since the two authors were unheard of.
I do not know if I agree with their decision or not. I think that people are happiest and do their best work if they are following their dreams, but on the other hand some things are just impractical. By saying no to Houghton Mifflin, they would have been forced to search for a new publisher. The chance of finding a publisher who would be willing to publish such a large book (when completed it would be well over 1,000 pages) was very slim. And there was the question of would the book sell in a country devoted to its TV dinners and McDonalds. But do these risks outweigh the dreams of the two women? I honestly don't know.
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2 comments:
From a business standpoint, I agree with the girls' decision to allow their book to be broken up (plus, 1000 pages is a crazy long cook book). However, I do agree with you Andrea that the girls would have been happier if they followed through with their original plan. I wonder what would have happened if they had gone through with their huge book. Would they have become sucessful, or would it have been a flop?
I think that the only way for these women to have successfully published such a cumbersome cookbook would be if they were already in the public's eye for some other cooking-related piece of business. Although I'm no avid cook, I could never imagine buying a huge book like that on speculation, considering I would have no idea of the quality of the recipes and because such a large book must be rather expensive. Their original idea was a bit silly and I'm glad they agreed to abridge it.
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