Book description
From the grand houses of Brighton to imposing London mansions, life as
a kitchen maid could be exhausting and demoralising. It’s not just being
at the beck and call of the people upstairs, when even the children of
the family can treat you like dirt, but having to deal with
temperamental cooks, starchy butlers and chauffeurs with a roving eye.
Marriage is the only escape, but with one evening off a week Margaret
has no time to lose. Between Perce the bus conductor (who brings his
mother on dates) and Mr Hailsham the fishmonger (who looks - and smells
- a bit like his wares), her initial prospects are hardly the stuff of
dreams. But then she meets Albert; a butcher boy-turned-milkman. Could
he be the perfect husband? And can she make the perfect wife when, as
she soon discovers, years spent serving others don't prepare you for
managing your own life? Soon Margaret begins to wonder - how can someone
like her ever improve their station?
Told with her trademark wit and warmth, Climbing the Stairs
is a unique, sharp-eyed tale of a time when the idea of masters and
servants began to lose its sway, and of a remarkable woman who grasped
the opportunities of this brave new world with both hands.
'Margaret Powell was the first person outside my family to introduce me
to that world, so near and yet seemingly so far away, where servants and
their employers would live their vividly different lives under one roof.
Her memories, funny and poignant, angry and charming, haunted me until,
many years later, I made my own attempts to capture those people for the
camera. I certainly owe her a great debt' Julian Fellowes Margaret
Powell was born in 1907 in Hove, and left school at the age of 13 to
start working. At 14, she got a job in a hotel laundry room, and a year
later went into service as a kitchen maid, eventually progressing to the
position of cook, before marrying a milkman called Albert. In 1968 the
first volume of her memoirs, Below Stairs
, was published to instant success and turned her into a celebrity. She
followed this up with Climbing the Stairs
, The Treasure Upstairs
and The Margaret Powell Cookery Book
. She died in 1984.
