Picture of author.

Julia Child (1912–2004)

Author of My Life in France

52+ Works 17,220 Members 289 Reviews 24 Favorited

About the Author

Julia Child was born in Pasadena, California on August 15, 1912. She received a Bachelor of Arts degree in history from Smith College in 1934 and served with the Office of Strategic Services in East Asia during World War II. After the war, Child lived in Paris for six years, attending the famous show more Cordon Bleu cooking school. After graduating from cooking school, Child opened her own culinary institute called, L'Ecole des Trois Gourmandes with her friends Simone Bech and Louisette Bertholle. She achieved critical acclaim with her first cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking which was first published in 1961 and is still in print today and helped to popularized French cuisine in America. Starting in 1963, Child hosted the first of many award winning cooking series on PBS, where she was best known for her exuberant personality and flamboyant cooking style. Her other books include The French Chef Cookbook; From Julia Child's Kitchen; and The Way to Cook. She also filmed an instructional video series on cooking and wrote columns for various magazines and newspapers. She died of kidney failure on August 13, 2004 at the age of 91. (Bowker Author Biography) show less

Includes the names: Julia Child, Juila Child, Julia Childs

Image credit: Belongs to Eat Life Photos

Series

Works by Julia Child

My Life in France (2004) 5,130 copies
Mastering the Art of French Cooking [Volume 1] (1961) — Author — 3,375 copies
The Way to Cook (1989) 1,343 copies
Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume Two (1970) — Author — 1,260 copies
The French Chef Cookbook (1968) 834 copies
Julia and Jacques Cooking at Home (1999) — Author — 679 copies
From Julia Child's Kitchen (1975) 505 copies
Julia Child & Company (1978) 373 copies
Julia Child & More Company (1979) 260 copies
Cooking with Master Chefs (1993) 231 copies
Julia Child's Menu Cookbook (1991) 130 copies
Italian Food 3 copies
McCall's – July 1978 — Contributor — 1 copy

Associated Works

Baking with Julia: Savor the Joys of Baking with America's Best Bakers (1996) — Original PBS Series — 959 copies
Beard on Food (1974) — Introduction, some editions — 248 copies
We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story [1993 film] (1993) — Actor — 107 copies
James Beard's Simple Foods (1993) — Foreword, some editions — 63 copies
Florence and Eric Take the Cake (1987) — Narrator, some editions — 38 copies
An American Feast : A Celebration of Cooking on Public Television (1999) — Foreword; Contributor — 33 copies
Sainsbury's Masterclass (1988) — Contributor — 7 copies

Tagged

American (52) autobiography (208) baking (200) biography (394) chef (107) cookbook (1,709) cookbooks (528) cookery (342) cooking (1,976) cuisine (63) culinary (52) first edition (48) food (993) food and cooking (82) food and drink (67) food writing (114) France (756) French (484) French cooking (313) French cuisine (85) French food (54) gastronomy (45) goodreads (53) hardcover (71) history (42) Julia Child (541) Kindle (71) kitchen (54) letters (55) memoir (593) non-fiction (916) own (76) Paris (89) read (81) recipes (228) reference (172) technique (52) to-read (517) travel (63) unread (48)

Common Knowledge

Legal name
Child, Julia Carolyn
Other names
McWilliams, Julia Carolyn
Birthdate
1912-08-15
Date of death
2004-08-13
Gender
female
Nationality
USA
Birthplace
Pasadena, California, USA
Place of death
Santa Barbara, California, USA
Cause of death
Kidney failure
Places of residence
Pasadena, California, USA
Paris, France
New York, New York, USA
Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
Santa Barbara, California, USA
Marseille, France (show all 7)
Washington, D.C., USA
Education
Smith College (B.A., history, 1934)
Occupations
cookbook writer
television host
Relationships
Child, Paul (husband)
Prud'homme, Alex (nephew)
Jones, Judith B, (editor)
Organizations
Office of Strategic Services (WWII)
Smith College
Awards and honors
Legion d'Honneur (2000)
Presidential Medal of Freedom (2003)
Emblem of Meritorious Civilian Service
Agent
William Loverd
Short biography
Julia Child was born in Pasadena, California. She was graduated from Smith College and worked for the OSS during World War II in Ceylon and China, where she met Paul Child. After they married they lived in Paris, where she studied at the Cordon Bleu and taught cooking with Simone Beck and Louisette Bertholle, with whom she wrote the first volume of Mastering the Art of French Cooking (1961). In 1963, Boston's WGBH launched The French Chef television series, which made her a national celebrity, earning her the Peabody Award in 1965 and an Emmy in 1966. Several public television shows and numerous cookbooks followed.

Members

Reviews

I'm reading this when I need a break from the novels. I adore it. Julia is just so cute!
 
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hmonkeyreads | 199 other reviews | Jan 25, 2024 |
Interesting book with a variety of recipes.
 
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Sassyjd32 | 3 other reviews | Dec 22, 2023 |
An interesting book. The recipes are definitely French and some I've never heard of!
 
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Sassyjd32 | 3 other reviews | Dec 22, 2023 |
It's hard to imagine how reading a book about food and recipes could be so interesting and entertaining, but it is, and down to the very last page. When you read how much time and effort Julia put into each and every single recipe in both Mastering the Art of French Cooking 1 & 2, you may want to locate copies for your own library. I But beware, Julia claims in the book, "My Life in France", that every edition required revisions and things corrected that had been missed or measurements that had been written out wrong, i.e.: 2 cups corrected to 2 tsps. These mistakes infuriated her because no matter how many times she went over it, she would always find mistakes. And Julia was a perfectionist!

You will find that Julia drops the "f" bomb a lot during the first half of the book..."french" words, phrases and sentences without explaining what they mean. You can choose to just skim over them or, as I did, download a free French pronunciation app onto your phone to help pronounce and decipher the meanings. Don't let this deter you from reading the book. It's still an excellent story, an excellent book. She revisits France for the last time back in about 1992, to pack up the rest of her and Paul's things. It's very sad that many of her friends and co-author had already passed on. She doesn't find leaving her beloved France as hard as she thought because it was the people who made France home and a part of her heart, not France, itself.
… (more)
 
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MissysBookshelf | 199 other reviews | Aug 27, 2023 |

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Statistics

Works
52
Also by
11
Members
17,220
Popularity
#1,291
Rating
4.2
Reviews
289
ISBNs
168
Languages
14
Favorited
24

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