This column is dedicated to Dear Mother (may she rest in peace) who always had to make sure that everyone had a napkin.
Not long ago Etiquetteer posted a photo of a table setting that included a paper dinner napkin. And it raised a few questioning eyebrows. Which raised Etiquetteer’s hackles. Which meant it was time to ferret out some historical precedent. Just what is or is not Perfectly Proper? Follow along, please, for some amusement and instruction.
First Etiquetteer has to make a scandalous confession: Etiquetteer hates napkins. Etiquetteer grew up with those flimsy paper napkins at every meal (you know the type), and no matter what, they fall on the floor. No matter what, they fall on the floor! And one is never sufficient for one’s needs. A napkin’s necessity is unquestioned, but as Winnie-the-Pooh would say, “Oh bother!”
In the West, table napkins were only cloth until the 1880s, when printed paper napkins arrived, mostly as souvenirs. Paper napkins got their start in the Land of Exquisite Paper, Japan. (This excellent 2017 piece on Tedium gives you the real napkin history, all the way back to Sparta where napkins were eaten because they were made of dough.) The Tedium piece also quotes this very interesting article from the Kansas Farmer newspaper of 1886, but Etiquetteer is going to quote a different part of it. “. . . the introduction of the paper napkin will do away with this social stratum [of the napkin ring], and instead of a clean napkin once a day, or twice a week, as the rule may be, everyone may be as fastidious as a Vanderbilt or a Gould, and have a dainty and new napkin three times a day, and at a very trifling expense. For a family of six, three napkins for each one every day would make 126 a week, which is quite an extra in the wash, besides the care to keep them in nice order.”
In other words, paper napkins are a labor-saving device that promote cleanliness. We often forget that in Olden Days cloth napkins were reused from meal to meal, so if you had an incident with your pot roast and gravy on Tuesday night, you might get to relive it on Thursday with your asparagus and hollandaise sauce. That’s where the napkin ring came in; after the meal you’d roll or fold up your napkin and any mistakes it might contain to wait until the next meal. Yeeccccccccchhhhhhh!
What do the experts say? The experts are concerned about freshness, starting with Emily Post Herself. From the Long Beach Independent in 1948, “Recently Emily Post was asked by one of New York City’s large department stores ‘Which is better form . . . fresh paper napkins at dinner, or the linen napkins you used at breakfast?’ She replied ‘Fresh paper napkins of course! It’s far better form to use paper napkins than linen napkins that were used at breakfast.’ As she says ‘. . . freshness is of first importance. A mussed napkins is unpleasing, a soiled one is unthinkable.’” (It’s worth noting that all internet writing about paper napkins cite this specific newspaper article.)
Amy Vanderbilt agreed. “Paper napkins are preferable to napkins to be used for more than one meal and placed in rings . . . Napkins reused are as incomprehensible to me as beds which have only one sheet changed. There are so many more sensible ways to economize.”*
Letitia Baldrige’s New Manners for New Times: A Complete Guide to Etiquette acknowledges that “most families use paper napkins these days.”** In writing about napkins rings, now only table décor, Ms. Baldrige wrote “Today, with bright colored napkins, including paper ones, the napkin rings are part of a unified decoration . . . “*** So she seems comfortable with the idea.
Etiquetteer’s beloved Miss Manners, however, is decidedly anti-paper napkin. In her essential Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior her response to the plea that paper napkins get the job done without having to be laundered is to compare them with paper underwear . . . Certainly she believes that cloth napkins elevate the tone of an ordinary family dinner (true), and that they are more durable — and therefore more economical in the long run — than paper napkins (which is debatable, when adding in labor).
We really come to a choice: freshness and convenience vs. elegance and a tangible reminder to sit up straight and mind your manners. Now Etiquetteer returns to that Long Beach Independent article: “Precious table linens could be reserved for the special occasions that really merited its use — and the expense of proper laundering afterward.” And, more importantly: “If your budgets are unlimited and you have a houseful of servants, then this little item doesn’t concern you. Otherwise — well, I prefer to run my house rather than let it run me. I can think of lots of things I’d rather do than wash and iron table linens — and I really like and appreciate good linens, too.” That was pretty much Dear Mother’s attitude as well.
How a household defines “special occasions” is going to vary. It could be holidays with family, birthdays, anniversaries, or every meal of the week. In fact, Etiquetteer would LOVE to hear whether you used cloth or paper napkins for your Thanksgiving dinner! Etiquetteer, a servantless bachelor, is likely to continue using paper, but will celebrate whatever choice you make for your household in the name of Perfect Propriety.
*Amy Vanderbilt’s New Complete Book of Etiquette: The Guide to Gracious Living, 1963, page 230.
**Page 199.
***Page 462.