WATTS, Stephen

[214] pp.

W.W. Norton & Company, Inc

1964

First American Edition

8 1/2″ x 5 7/8″

Here is not only The Biography of a Hotel but of a personage of towering capacity, Csar Ritz. Born of Swiss peasants, he was destined to become an exponent and arbiter of taste and elegance in public entertainment whose impress endures. He was the cherished, admired friend of the most illustrious and his name now appears as an adjective in all the better dictionaries.

Csar Ritz was discovered and launched by Europe’s most fastidious folk while running the superb little Hotel Minerva at Baden Baden in the heyday of that celebrated and fashionable spa. He seems to have known instinctively the virtues of meticulous housekeeping; of personal service of the most dedicated but unobtrusive sort, and of simplicity as the basis of the finest cuisinewith the prestigious Escoffier as dictator of his kitchens.

Three criticisms: The book needs and deserves an index. Second, American editors should have translated English pounds into dollars. Third, and most exasperating: The use of the insufferable term an hotel on virtually every page. Presumably this means an house of refreshment for an human being.