The Short Life & Long Times of Mrs. Beeton

We each of us strive for domestic bliss -- the perfect marriage, the perfect home, the perfect family -- and we may look to Elle Deco, Delia and Nigella to give us tips on achieving the unattainable. Kathryn Hughes, acclaimed for her biography of George Eliot, has pulled back the curtains to look at the creator of the ultimate book on keeping house. In Victorian England what did every middle-class house-wife need to create the perfect home? The Book of Household Management. Oh, but of course! Mrs Beeton would no doubt declare with brisk authority. But Mrs Beeton, is not quite the matronly figure that has kept her name resonating 150 years after the publication of The Book of Household Management. Those famous pages of carefully costed recipes, warnings about not gossiping to visitors, and making sure you always keep your hat on in someone else's house -- indispensible in the molding of the Victorian domestic bliss. But there are many myths surrounding the legend of Mrs Beeton. It is very possible that her book was given so much social standing through fear as she was believed to be a bit of an old dragon. It seems though that Mrs Beeton was a series of contradictions. Kathryn Hug