Hotel Splendide
(Book)

"...first published in 1941"--title page verso.

"In this charming and uproariously funny hotel memoir, Ludwig Bemelmans uncovers the fabulous world of the Hotel Splendide -- the thinly disguised stand-in for the Ritz -- a luxury New York hotel where he worked as a waiter in the 1920s. With equal parts affection and barbed wit, he uncovers the everyday chaos that reigns behind the smooth facades of the gilded dining room and banquet halls. In hilarious detail, Bemelmans sketches the hierarchy of hotel life and its strange and fascinating inhabitants: from the ruthlessly authoritarian maître d'hôtel Monsieur Victor to the kindly waiter Mespoulets to Frizl the homesick busboy. Illustrated with his own charming line drawings, Bemelmans' tales of a bygone era of extravagance are as charming as they are riotously entertaining."--Book flap.

"Everyone knows the French schoolgirl Madeline, heroine of the popular picture books for children. Their author and illustrator, Ludwig Bemelmans (1898-1962), was a prolific writer of a great many other books too (more than 40, including novels), as well as a painter and cartoonist. What a pleasure to see that his fictionalized memoir “Hotel Splendide,” first published in 1941, has recently been reissued. It's an uproarious account of his life as a waiter at the thinly disguised Ritz-Carlton in the 1920s. The outlandish characters he encounters include a con man magician, a murderous waiter, a dissolute Cuban marquis and a handsome Senegalese dishwasher with “shoulders like two shovels,” whose dream is to become a doorman and wear beautiful livery."--The Wall Street Journal.