#TBT: How To Give Successful Dinner Parties, a Blast From the Past
The dinner party is an ancient art, and one that ladies of the past took very seriously. While we don’t necessarily jive with everything said in this book (like that you must have a man friend help you host – it’s just too difficult! – even if you’re not in a relationship/married), we found some gems in Adele Whitely Fletcher’s How to Give Successful Dinner Parties that were too good not to share. We particularly love her strategy for dealing with bores.
Invitation List: Strategize
Thoughtful people are great and all…
“Are there a few good talkers on your list? Quiet, thoughtful people can be very wonderful. But a party entirely or even largely composed of them is not likely to be.”
Greetings!
Okay, we’re actually with her here. It’s your party. Muster up some excitement.
“Hosts and hostesses who greet their guests with limp handshakes and a lukewarm, ‘Oh, hello there,’ deserve no better party than they are likely to have. Greetings of this kind are enough to make guests wonder if they were invited by mistake.”
Conversation – The Life Line of a Dinner Party
Bad news, people. You do have to act like your friend’s new boyfriend is interesting.
“No matter who is talking or whatever is being said, a hostess should show interest. She should not lean back and inspect her nail polish. Nor should she keep looking, nervously, toward the kitchen.”
The Bores
Every party’s got one.
“It is a rare group that does not include, at least, one bore. He may be a self-made man with more success than he can gracefully handle. She may be a woman who talks in a slow, dull monotone and who is, to boot, loquacious.”
“There are also the double-bores, the parents with limitless anecdotes to illustrate the superiority of their children. There also are those who come to dinner parties with an unbelievable collection of horror stories and – if they are not stopped – tell all of them.
“A hostess cannot bluntly interrupt a guest. But there are ways of shortening monologues and changing the subject. A bore, of course, should never be asked questions. A single question can prolong a bore’s discourse interminably.”
Pre-Dinner Cocktails:
We’re pretty impressed that her friends can handle two cocktails before dinner. Rock on, Fletch.
“To say how many cocktails should be served before dinner would be presumptuous. It depends on the guests. Two cocktails are generally favored. Two cocktails are not likely to cause women to become silly, men to turn argumentative, or result in a dinner prepared with thought and care going unappreciated.”
Lastly, Fletcher’s got some advice on the guests who never want to go home.
“Sometimes guests are bestirred when if a hostess empties ashtrays and carries used glasses into the kitchen. But if, in spite of this, the stayer-oners ask for a nightcap, although they already have had two or three, a host will serve them but not take one himself.”