Joseph Wechsberg Explained
Joseph Wechsberg (29 August 1907 – 10 April 1983) was a Jewish Moravian writer, journalist, musician, and gourmet. Born in Ostrava, in Moravia, Czechoslovakia, he and his wife requested and received asylum in the United States in 1939 when Germany invaded Czechoslovakia. His mother was among the Czech Jews interned by the Nazis and later was murdered at Auschwitz.[1] Over his career he was a prolific writer who wrote over two dozen works of nonfiction, including books on music and musicians, and contributed numerous articles to publications such as The New Yorker.[2]
Bibliography
Books
- Book:
- Looking for a Bluebird, Penguin, 1948
- Blue Trout & Black Truffles (the peregrinations of an Epicure), Alfred A.Knopf, 1954
- Avalanche, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1958[3]
- Red Plush and Black Velvet: the Story of Dame Nellie Melba and her Times, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1962.
- The Merchant Bankers, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1966.
- The Murderers Among Us, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1967. LCN 67-13204.
- The Voices, 1969[4]
- The First Time Around: Some Irreverent Recollections, Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1970. LCN 75-108954.
- The Glory of the Violin, Viking Adult, 1973,
- The Lost World of the Great Spas, New York: Harper & Row, 1979
- The Vienna I Knew, Doubleday & Company, Inc., Garden City, New York, 1979, ISBN 0-385-12674-3
- Trifles Make Perfection: Selected Essays of Joseph Wechsberg, Boston: David R. Godine, 1999 LCN 98-29258
Short fiction
- Stories
| width=25% | Title | Year | First published | Reprinted/collected | Notes |
|---|
| data-sort-value="magic carpet" | The magic carpet | 1950 | Wechsberg, Joseph . January 7, 1950 . The magic carpet . The New Yorker . 25 . 46 . 23–26. | | |
| New York is full of girls | | | Book: Wechsberg, Joseph . Birmingham, Frederic A. . The girls from Esquire . London . Arthur Barker . 1953 . 93–100 . New York is full of girls. | | |
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- Notes
In popular culture
Wechsberg's book Blue Trout & Black Truffles was gifted by Nick Kokonas to Grant Achatz while Nick was trying to convince Grant to form a restaurant partnership with him. The result was Alinea, the only Chicago restaurant to retain a three-star status, Michelin’s highest accolade.
Notes and References
- Web site: Joseph Wechsberg's biography in German.
- Web site: Nearly-exhaustive list of English language books written by Joseph Wechsberg.
- An account of a deadly avalanche in Blons, Austria, in 1954.
- Account written in Vienna of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.
