Three O'Clock Dinner
NY: The Viking Press, 1945. 1st. Hardcover_cloth. 5.75"x8.13"x1". 296 pages. Dard green cloth boards with gold block exposing dark green letters on front. Same on spine. Spine straight, binding tight, pages clean and cream colored. Dated on title page with Viking Press emblem. Top edge painted matching green. Deckled edge. Very nice. Corners slightly bumped. Southern Author's Award winner. Collectible - VeryGood / no jacket. Item #2287
This edition is produced in full compliance with all war production board conservation orders.
"First published in 1945 to international acclaim and winner of the Southern Authors Award, Three O'Clock Dinner is Josephine Pinckney's best-selling novel about an ill-fated marriage on the eve of World War II. This powerful tale written by a consummate Charleston insider and set in the historic city resonates with universal appeal by daring to touch on topics that had been taboo. Three O'Clock Dinner reveals how the modern world has intruded in a most unwelcome way upon the Redcliffs, a Charleston family long on pedigree but short on cash. Mortified when their son "Tat" elopes with the henna-hairied daughter of the Hessenwinkles, an especially galling bourgeois clan, the Redcliffs are determined to respond with civility. They invite their son, his new wife, and her family for Sunday dinner, served at the traditional time of three in the afternoon. Tension builds across an expanse of white damask. After mint julep aperitifs, dinner claret, and Madeira toasts, a chance remark ignites the novel's climax amid a flurry of raised voices, hurt feelings, and broken china. Their new daughter-in-law's revelation further shatters the Redcliffs' well-ordered society but opens a door to forgiveness and redemption." Goodreads.
Price: $35.00