Nov 142006
An alert NoodleFood reader send me a link to this fantastic interview with Miss Manners. She discusses her personal history, the history of etiquette, the distinction between manners, etiquette, and law, and much more. Some of her comments were quite thought-provoking, but I particularly liked this tidbit at the end:
Cole: I was just thinking . . . My father’s highest accolade about somebody was that he was a gentleman.Martin: Exactly. But in court societies you’d be a gentleman by birth no matter how you behaved. That’s the point about America–you have to behave like a gentleman to be a gentleman. And surely that is a superior system.
Indeed!
