Please Don't Eat the Doily: Contemporary Manners

Joan McGrath is a Toronto Board of Education library consultant.

Good manners: where would we be without them? Quite possibly tossing bones at one another across the bonfire warming our cave homes, as a form of repartee. Knowing what to do in all predictable situations is a source of enormous comfort. Not knowing, on the other hand, can be a costly and/or damaging business: costly in social embarrassments and lost opportunities, in promotions or advancement missed and friendships damaged.

This useful book of pointers includes guidelines for behavior at extremely formal gatherings, in less formal social situations, as a guest or as host or hostess, or in business situations. In addition to the predictable but necessary do’s and don’ts at table, attention is paid to the neglected area of telephone manners, to the increasingly dodgey matter of smoking or not smoking, when and where; behavior at sports events or in shopping places, at restaurants, and at such ceremonial events as weddings, funerals, confirmations and Bar and Bat Mitzvahs. Clearly and simply written, and informed by clear-headed common sense, pleasantly illustrated with excellent color photographs, this glossy ring-bound volume provides answers to a lot of questions that perhaps aren’t asked often enough. (One quibble, and a small one, about using “Ms.” Correct spelling is Ms — itis not an abbreviation and requires no period.)