Food and the Novel in Nineteenth-Century America by Mark McWi... - 9780759120945

Food and the Novel in Nineteenth-Century AmericaAuthor(s): Mark McWilliams\nFormat: Hardback\nPublisher: AltaMira Press, United States\nImprint: AltaMira Press\nISBN-13: 9780759120945, 978-0759120945\nSynopsis\nFood and the Novel in Nineteenth-Century America revolves around the 1840 presidential election when, according to campaign slogans, candidates were what they ate. Skillfully deploying the rhetoric of republican simplicitythe belief that plain dress, food, and manners were signs of virtue in the young republicWilliam Henry Harrison defeated Martin Van Buren by aligning the incumbent with the European luxuries of pt de foie gras and soupe la reine while maintaining that he survived on raw beef without salt. The effectiveness of such claims reflected not only the continuing appeal of the frontier and the relatively primitive nature of American cooking, but also a rhetorical struggle to define how eating habits and culinary practices fit into ideas of the American character.\n\.