Books : The Party : Excerpts

From the Introduction

A while ago a producer on Good Morning America called me in Washington and asked me if I would come up to New York and be on the show. It was right before Christmas and they were doing a week of "Holiday Entertaining" segments. At first I refused. After all, I was a serious journalist and this was a totally frivolous subject. It would ruin my reputation. Jackie Leo was persuasive, however, and also, there was a party I wanted to go to in New York the night before, so I finally said yes.

When I arrived at the studio the morning of the show, Jackie told me that I would be introduced as a "society hostess." I nearly fainted. I implored her not to have me introduced as a hostess. Being called a "Washington hostess" was bad enough, though at least that had a political connotation. But "society hostess"? How had I managed to get myself into this, anyway? Was it too late to get out of it? Before I knew it I was whisked into makeup, taken down to the greenroom, and summoned into the studio. I was seated at a dining room table that was set with china and silver and party napkins, across from my host, Charlie Gibson. It was getting worse by the minute.

"We have invited," he was saying to the camera, "author, journalist, and"—he looked at me, quizzically it seemed—"sometime Washington hostess, Sally Quinn..."

The dreaded word.

"The first time," I demurred, with less than total candor and with a slightly embarrassed laugh, "I've ever been described as a hostess...."

Charlie looked betrayed. If I wasn't a hostess, what was I doing on the "Holiday Entertaining" segment?

We climbed over that hurdle and segued nicely into a discussion of party rules. I suggested that it was important to stay informed, to read the paper. I was behaving perfectly until Charlie asked me, "What happens if conversation lags? What do you do?"

"Well," I responded brightly, "as I said, I think, you watch the Today Show..." The words weren't out of my mouth before I realized what I had just said.

But Charlie was not about to let me get away with that. "Good Morning America!" he corrected in mock horror.

What could I do but fling my head down on the table and cover it with my hands?

Afterward I was greeted by chilly smiles and wan "well done's," and I escaped as quickly as possible.

But I did begin to think about the word "hostess" and what it means.

The dictionary defines "hostess" as "a female host; a woman who serves in the capacity of a host." A "host" is "a person who receives or entertains guests in his own home or elsewhere." There's certainly nothing offensive there.

"A person who receives or entertains guests in his own home" doesn't really sound like someone to be disdained, and generally the word "host" is not a derisive term. After all, who among us has not at least offered someone something to drink in his or her own home? I can hardly think of the person who could not at some point be described as a "host." The word "hostess," however, has come to mean (if not in the dictionary, at least in the vernacular) a frivolous woman with nothing better to do than give parties.

And certainly nobody would ever have asked my husband then, or today, to go on Good Morning America to discuss holiday entertaining, even though he is a great host and likes to be involved in the planning of all our parties. Can anyone imagine ever referring to him as "host Ben Bradlee"?

Years ago, in the days of legendary Washington hostesses such as Perle Mesta and Gwen Cafritz, playing that role was one of the few ways women of intelligence and ambition could accrue power. Successful hostesses were revered. For these women, entertaining was their life. It was their job.

One of my first jobs in Washington after graduating from college was as social secretary to the Algerian ambassador, Cherif Guellal. It was 1967 when I went to work at the embassy. Washington party giving was in full swing, and the role of hostess was still an admired one. Certainly Cherif, who was a glamorous thirty two-year-old bachelor, was one of the most celebrated hosts in the city.

Two years later, when I began covering parties for the Washington Post "Style" section, one could already sense the change in atmosphere. It was the late sixties, the Vietnam War was raging, feminism was on the rise, and all of our social values were being questioned in a fundamental way. In that context, parties and hostesses really did not seem appropriate.

Women began rejecting the role of hostess. They went out and joined social movements, got jobs, became activists. They took friends out to restaurants, or simply didn't entertain at all. It became almost a badge of honor to say, "I never entertain." The worst, the most dismissive, thing you could have said about another woman, in Washington, at least, was that she was "just a hostess."

"The Washington hostess" was rapidly becoming extinct.

By the early seventies writer Barbara Howar summed it up: "If I thought my epitaph would read HOSTESS I'd refuse to die."

She didn't die, but the Washington hostess did. And nobody mourned her. At first.

Somewhere along the line it became clear that something was missing. The truth was that we had lost one of the most important avenues of social communication and because of that, things just weren't as much fun anymore.

Ten years ago I would never have allowed myself to be persuaded to go on Good Morning Americato discuss holiday entertaining. It would have been too humiliating. We were still all locked into the notion that women should be involved only in "serious" ventures.

And yet, and yet...entertaining today is a multibilliondollar industry in this country, not to mention around the world. Women, and men too, in many professions must entertain as part of their careers. The idea that it was demeaning to "receive or entertain guests" in one's home seemed to lose credence.

The President and the First Lady (our country's First Host and Hostess) routinely entertain around forty thousand guests in the White House just in the few weeks before Christmas. And in the first four years of their administration, the Clintons spent over $3.5 million on parties. That's political entertaining.

One of the main roles of ambassadors is entertaining. That's diplomatic. Major corporations all over the world have huge expense accounts and entertainment allowances. That's commercial. And American taxpayers even subsidize individuals and companies by allowing tax deductions for entertaining business associates.

There is nothing frivolous, shallow, or irrelevant about entertaining when you're talking about that kind of money, energy, time, and commitment, which both men and women, professionally and privately, expend for mere parties.

And never mind the big money; think about your five-year-old's birthday party. What about the hamburgers and hot dogs, potato salad and baked beans you served at the Fourth of July barbecue or the tea party for your grandmother's ninetieth birthday? That's entertaining.

Imagine Bedouins in their tents serving lamb to a visitor, Eskimos producing fish for some explorers, an Amazonian tribe welcoming tourists with a special drink. That's it too.

We all do it. Everyone entertains someone sometimes. It's part of social life. So if you're going to do it, you might as well do it right.

How do you do it right

Just follow the Golden Rule. "Do unto others..." Treat your guests the way you would like to be treated. It's as simple as that.