Author: Paul Gallico
Paul Gallico’s book Flowers for Mrs Harris is from a list of books I noted down when I read Stephanie Butland’s book Found in a Bookshop. In that book, Loveday opens a book pharmacy during the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK, and people get book prescriptions. I remember reading the book and thinking that I could not possibly create such a massive reading list. Then a customer letter came in that spoke to me, and I realized I do not have to have all the lists; that one was for me. I was right because I absolutely loved Flowers for Mrs Harris. It was 1000 % my cup of tea, and I have now moved up the other books from that list on my ‘to-read’ list.
Mrs Harris is a cleaner (char lady or char, as called in the book) in London who suddenly discovers Christian Dior when cleaning one of her clients’ houses. She sees one of Dior’s haute couture dresses, falls in love with the beauty of the dress, and decides to start saving to buy herself a Dior dress. She knows she would never wear it because she does not attend events that would enable wearing that dress, but she just wants to have it in her wardrobe and watch it every day.
Mrs Harris then embarks on a life of suffrage and depriving herself of what little she had, including one weekly cinema visit, tea bags, and even food. It takes her 2 years and 7 months to save up enough for a dress, along with a lottery win, and she finally goes to Paris. There, she finds friends and acceptance she never had in the class society of London, which becomes a focal point of the story in the second half of the book. So, Flowers for Mrs Harris is a class and a fashion story. In the latter, Gallico celebrates fashion and never portrays it as trivial, which I obviously loved.
The sociological value of this book is immense. The novel is not just about fashion but also about recognition and legitimacy, and importantly, who is allowed to belong to certain spaces, and why. Mrs Harris does not change with saving up the money. She is still the same simple and honest cleaning lady, but others start to see her differently because of her appreciation of haute couture. The Dior dress and her desire to own one thus function as symbolic capital, which grants access, but it also reveals the arbitrariness of that access. Mrs Harris is a cleaning lady, but she understands the cultural and symbolic value of the House of Dior and its designs, so she belongs at a certain level, and fashion people accept her, but customers do not, so a fight happens at the haute couture showing because a wealthy customer does not wish to sit next to a cleaning lady. But, fashion people (as is the argument of my forthcoming book and my already-published textbook), accept her because she shows cultural capital relevant and recognized in fashion. This enables her to affect the lives of the French fashion people in positive ways, which then results in friendship. The novel thus challenges the idea that taste, elegance, and belonging are the preserve of the elite.
An amazing novel, written in 1959, but not much has changed in fashion. This is still relevant, and the prose is absolutely beautiful. I could not recommend this book enough.
Thank you for reading!