An excellent trip through the remaining bookstores of the Quarter and its people and oddities. I’d keep this column as a reference if I were you…Although, his worry about being judged by the booksellers of the Quarter when browsing or buying is entirely unwarranted. If anyone cares less about your preferences than the people of the Quarter, I don’t know who they are.
Rembert Browne (@rembert) is a staff writer for Grantland.
Category Archives: French Quarter
Drink and Learn
Drink & Learn experiences are themed, interactive presentations that uses famous drinks and ingredients to tell the rich history of New Orleans. Join culinary historian Elizabeth Pearce at unique locations all around town as she regales you with tales of rum, rebellion, whiskey, prohibition and more!
Commentary from yours truly on The Lens
Public markets were once a dominant feature of New Orleans’ commercial landscape. There were almost three dozen of them, ranging from those still well-known — the French Market and St. Roch, above all — to long-forgotten markets on Poydras, Washington, Carrollton, Ninth Street, Soraparu, Magazine, Dryades, Claiborne, Treme, St. Bernard, Port, Jefferson, Second Street, Keller, LeBreton, St. John, Ewing, Prytania, Mehle, Memory, Suburban, Rocheblave, Maestri, Delamore, McCue, Lautenschlaeger, Zengel, Guillotte, Doulluth, Behrman and Foto.
200 years in one book
My pal Dr. Nancy Dixon has just released her amazing anthology of New Orleans literature with fascinating historical and literary introductions by herself.
The reason this book was undertaken by this busy university professor was that the lack of a current anthology hampered her teaching and limited regular folks’ access to the treasure trove of authors that have written about our beloved city. I agree; if this had been around when I was a lit-hungry teenager roaming the Quarter, I could have expanded my knowledge of good writing and my own city so much more and probably reduced the petty crime/nuisance levels around Jackson Square for a few specific years.
From the first play performed in the city, to the details on the Creoles of color and the Los Isleños community, all the way to current writers, (she did stop before 2005 which makes me hope for her post 2005-levee break anthology to come along later), Dr. Dixon gives you a sweet sampling of great writers and/or great pieces to pick up at your leisure. Read a few and then to go to your local dusty used bookstore to dive deeper into those works that appeal to you.
Author Nancy Dixon and me at one of her first public book signings for N.O. Lit: 200 years of New Orleans Literature
great local bookstores have it in stock:
http://www.octaviabooks.com/event/nancy-dixon-no-lit
or buy it directly from the publisher and get it inscribed:
Roy Guste, photographer
Holiday parade in French Quarter 2014, captured by Roy Guste
Roy Guste, photographer
Roy Guste, a fixture in the Quarter continues to add amazing images of his place; find them at his gallery downriver or buy online.
BOOK SIGNING WITH POPPY TOOKER, AUTHOR OF “LOUISIANA EATS!”
On Saturday, December 7, from 2 to 4 p.m., culinary enthusiast, author, and radio host Poppy Tooker will sign copies of her new book Louisiana Eats!: The People, Their Food, and Their Stories (Pelican Publishing Company, August 2013) at The Historic New Orleans Collection’s museum shop, located at 533 Royal Street in the French Quarter.
Book signing with Poppy Tooker, author of Louisiana Eats!: The People, Their Food, and Their Stories
Saturday, December 7
2–4 p.m.
The Shop at The Collection, 533 Royal Street
Free and open to the public. The book retails for $24.95 and will be available for purchase at the event.
As the host of the popular public radio show Louisiana Eats!, Tooker is passionate about food and the people who make it. Her new book gives readers an in-depth, behind the scenes look at Louisiana food producers and personalities interviewed on her show.
The book introduces the reader to stories previously untold with transcripts of 15 interviews with specialists of iconic Louisiana foods, accompanying essays and recipes and portrait photographs by David Spielman of the subjects. Tooker, a native New Orleanian, examines the place that food and race play on Louisiana’s tables and champions the growers and food producers who are preserving endangered indigenous ingredients like Creole cream cheese and mirlitons.
Louisiana Eats! retails for $24.95 and will be available for purchase at the event. In addition to hosting the signing with Tooker, The Shop at The Collection will also be hosting its annual Member Appreciation Day and trunk show with Mignon Faget, Ltd. on December 7, giving readers and shoppers plenty of reasons to visit. More information is available at http://www.hnoc.org or (504) 523-4662.
Love Letter to My City
Well, this letter could really be titled “Love Letter to the French Quarter” since that is where my mother brought me as a “world-weary” teenager and where I found my city. That lovely introduction to it all was why I write about the Quarter today; so that others will come to it and find their own home. I wrote this in an hour and sent it off without rereading it again so that I would have to let the emotion stay in there.
French Quarter block by block 
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