I have not been to the Restaurant Drouant in Paris but the menu is enticing and it has a regular clientele.
“The ten members of the academy are usually called les Dix (the Ten). They meet the first Tuesday of each month, except in summer. Since 1914, they have convened in an oval room, the salon Goncourt, on the second floor of the restaurant Drouant, place Gaillon, in the heart of Paris. The cutlery which they use while dining there constitutes the main physical continuity of the academy. Each new member receives the fork and knife of the member whom he (or she) is replacing, and the member’s name is engraved on the knife and the fork.” (Wikipedia)
What is this academy? It sounds like something invented for a Sherlock Holmes or a Father Brown story but it is real. It is the Académie Goncourt, founded in 1882 to encourage French literature. The Prix Goncourt is awarded annually to the author of “the best and most imaginative prose work of the year” written in French of course. Although the prize is a token €10 it carries great prestige. Perhaps the Booker was inspired by this noble project?
I classify The Order of the Day by Éric Vuillard as a novella (129 pages); The Guardian calls it an historical essay with literary flourishes. It describes the history of Germany from 1933 to the Anschluss in 1938, covering ground well-known to most of us. Der Spiegel: “Brilliant … a lightning-like transformation of a tired, old and far too often told story into a shocking new narrative”. New Yorker: “Remarkable … It captures the bizarre blend of wishful thinking, clownish self-importance, and cold calculation that characterised many of the Nazis’ powerful enablers”. It casts a sinister light on German industrialists and British politicians and I am glad to have read it. It won the Prix Goncourt in 2017.
The silverware is what interests me. Assuming that the members of the academy have about a thirty-year run–are judged suitably mature to serve about 50, judge themselves done about 80–the silverware should be on about its fourth turnover. I would think that the engraving space would be harder to find now.
The same thing occurred to me. Perhaps they use initials not full names. Or Wikipedia has got it wrong and there are only the names of the original ten.