Wagon-bar: Une petite histoire du repas ferroviaire
Arthur Mettetal, Géry Nolan and Jean-Pierre Williot
Éditions Textuel
French
Hardcover
224 pages
150 x 210 mm
2024
ISBN 9782386290190
This delightfully old-fashioned little story of railway catering has the feel of a family album. Who doesn’t remember that meal tray with its slice of ham that was too pink or that over-grilled croque-monsieur? From the very chic dining cars of the Compagnie internationale des wagons-lits, a pioneer in the field at the end of the 19th century , to the orange and green design of the Corail bar in the 1980s, this book tells the fascinating evolution of “on-board gastronomy”. The luxury and refinement of the interwar period were followed by the many innovations of the 1950s and 1960s: bars and snacks, street vending and meal trays responded to changes in passengers’ eating habits. The 1970s then marked a major break, with the disappearance of on-board kitchens on trains and the widespread use of take-away sales. Whether advertising photographs or documentary archives, these images outline the contours of a railway history as much as a cultural one, nourishing – at high speed – our intimate mythologies.
(source: https://www.editionstextuel.com/livre/wagon-bar)
About the Authors
Arthur Mettetal is a railway historian and specialist in railway and industrial heritage. For many years, he has been interested in the tangible and intangible traces of industry, using the photographic medium in each of his projects. He also specialises in managing company archives and collections. After working on the working-class memory of the Métaleurop factory in 2011, he is now looking at the place of factory chimneys as “social and working-class verticalities” in the Nord region. Co-curator of a number of exhibitions (Usine des mémoires, Signal industriel, Orient-Express & Cie), he is currently Executive Director of the Endowment Fund Orient Express.
(source: https://www.rencontres-arles.com/en/commissaires/view/246/arthur-mettetal#:~:text=Lives%20and%20works%20in%20Ivry,photography%20in%20all%20his%20projects.)
Géry Nolan is the director of the department of archives at the SNCF, France’s national railway service.
(source: https://fr.linkedin.com/in/g%C3%A9ry-nolan-2560b352?trk=public_post_feed-reaction-header)
Jean-Pierre Williot is a historian of techniques and innovation, Professor of Contemporary History at the François Rabelais University in Tours and Director of the LEA – The Food Team. He is also Vice-President of the Scientific Council of the European Institute of Food History and Cultures and co-director of the collection European Food Issues published by Peter Lang.
His research work focuses on the food sector and on network companies (gas, railways) to analyse innovation processes. He studies the various players of the food chain from the perspective of economic, technical and social change. His research subjects cover a diverse field including cooking techniques, food and mobility, history of food products, urban supply, the transmission of food cultures.
(source: https://food20.fr/chercheur/jean-pierre-williot/?lang=en#:~:text=Jean%2DPierre%20Williot%20is%20a,the%20LEA%20%E2%80%93%20The%20Food%20Team.)
About the Publisher
Éditions Textuel is a French publishing house founded in 1995 in Paris and located at n o 13, quai de Conti / n o 4, impasse de Conti . Multidisciplinary, this publisher explores various editorial fields: human sciences, contemporary arts, photography, music and corporate books. It is part of the Actes Sud 2 group.
editionstextuel.com
(source: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89ditions_Textuel)
