The Gentle Art of Domesticity

January 2, 2008

Ten years ago I’d have laughed if someone had told me that when I reached my 30s I’d buy a book with the title of The Gentle Art of DomesticityI’d have laughed, in fact there are people who know me now well (thinking Mr. Lacer) who would laugh to. I am not a domestic person (says she who lives in chaos) but that as Jane Brocket defines so well at the beginning of the book is domestication not domesticity, to me domestication sounds like something humans did to wild buffalo thousands of years ago (or whenever) to turn them into cows, domestication is the daily hum drum of remembering to turn on the dishwasher and vacuum the floors and I’m not very good at that, domesticity is as Brocket describes it ‘creativity within the domestic space’, now I like that, so I brought the book.

The Gentle Art of Domesticity has a few mixed reviews on Amazon, with criticism that there is little actual instruction and no index. Yes there is little actual instruction and no index but it’s not that sort of book, it’s more of a book you dip into, flick through the very nice photos and think “mmm I wouldn’t mind having a go at something like that” and then you can read the accompanying text and go to the resource section at the back and find out more, it’s inspiration basically and I have had to admit after looking through the book and finding her photo of her wavy crochet blanket, crochet suddenly seems way more appealing and I’ll probably do more research into that. Just like I’ll be following her method for growing basil this year (I’ve never had much success before) and I’ll be trying out her recipe for Battenberg cake next time my sister comes to tea, who knows what I’ll find next time I flick through. Generally though as someone who is already a keen cook but on the other arts of domesticity very much a novice, I thought the baking recipes looked particularly nice and maybe an index would have been nice for those but there’s always book marks, maybe I could embroider one?

Continuing on the subject though of Brocket’s recipes I noticed on Amazon that she has another book coming out in July this year, called Cherry Cake and Ginger Beer, a collection of recipes inspired by classic children’s stories, sounds fantastic, one definitely to add to my pre-order list, I just hope there’s an index though for this one.

On one final note Jane Brocket also has a blog called Yarnstorm, which is in a similar style to her book, the blog is definitely worth a look.

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