The only mistake I made in reading Business as Usual by Jane Oliver and Ann Stafford this year was that I did it too early: this would have been the perfect book to soothe and comfort during the stressful early months of the pandemic but it was just as delightful when read in the calmness of January.
Published in 1933 (and reissued this spring by Handheld Press), Business as Usual tells with dashing epistolary style and comic illustrations the story of Hilary Fane. Hilary, a young woman of twenty-seven with a history degree from Oxford and previous work experience as both a teacher and librarian, is trying to fill the time before she marries her fiancé Basil, a young doctor. Anticipating at least a year before the wedding and, having been made redundant from her last job, Hilary is looking for a way to occupy herself. As she explains to Basil:
…I know I couldn’t wait for you if I were idle, sitting about and trying to fill the gap between one lovely experience and another with those dreary little sociabilities that you despise as much as I do. I wish I had the kind of talents that you’d really like to have about the house, my lamb. It would all be so much simpler if my bent were music or if I could write. But it isn’t any use, Basil, I haven’t any talents; even my drawings always got me into trouble. I’ve just got undecorative ability and too much energy to be happy without a job.
And so she sets off, leaving her parents’ comfortable Scottish home for exceedingly humble lodgings in London and a job in a department store (a thinly veiled Selfridges). She eventually finds herself working in the store’s library (I would never complain about going shopping if department stores still had these!) and the story follows her throughout the year as she advances at work, makes friends, and discovers the simple pleasures of her new life:
Oh, Basil, there are compensations! It’s worth sleep-walking from nine to six all the week just to wake up on Saturday with half a day and a night and another day after that unquestionably one’s own. I came out of Everyman’s and watched all the other people with hockey sticks and skates and suit-cases tearing for buses. But I strolled, feeling marvellous. Rather as if I’d kicked off a tightish pair of shoes.
Hilary is a wonderful character, full of energy and warmth and attractively straightforward in discussing anything on her mind. Basil, we can tell from Hilary’s side of the correspondence, doesn’t share these traits:
I can fail and start again. And with you to believe in my work, I could.
Only, now and then, I feel you don’t. Do try to. I mean, think of me as a creature, not just as a possible wife who will persist in doing things that tend to disqualify her. I love you frightfully; but I want your companionship and tolerance and understanding even more than other things. I wonder if you see?
Basil, the reader decides long before Hilary, must go. Luckily, there is a very suitable replacement close at hand.
I love stories about work – I find hearing about people’s working hours and salaries and how they manage to live on said salaries endlessly fascinating – and I adore epistolary novels so the combination of the two was always going to be something that interested me. But this book manages to be far more than interesting. The reader cannot help but adore Hilary, who is endlessly curious, admirably efficient, and inspiringly intrepid. It is a book to laugh over and to read for comfort and inspiration when you are feeling daunted by the world. It is, frankly, quite perfect, which is why I am picking it up again as the book to see out 2020 with. It’s never too soon to reread great books.
I placed a Request for Purchase at our library for this title many, many months ago…still waiting for the shipment to arrive. I may need to just purchase it myself, it sounds wonderful.
A copy of your own would be a solid investment, sure to bring pleasure on many future rereadings. I’m happy to say my library followed my suggestion for purchase and I’ve been delighted to see the hold queue backing up for their copies. Clearly word is spreading about how good it is!
Somehow, I still haven’t picked up a copy of this and I really should – it sounds marvellous!
I obviously think so 🙂
I’ve had a hard time settling on books to read for the past week or so. Maybe I need to re-read this one instead!
Happy New Year a little early – I hope it’s filled with wonderful books.
Yes! That is a solid plan for battling the reading doldrums. Good luck and best wishes for a very happy 2021!
I loved this one too, I hope you enjoy reading it again. Happy New year.
I can now confirm it is just as good on rereading!
I know so many people who have read and loved this, I really need to pick it up when it’s spend the book tokens time!
You do! I promise you’ll enjoy it!
I broke my book-buying ban last year and bought this shortly after the pandemic began. It took awhile but was worth waiting for, I loved it and I think I read the whole thing in one day, maybe even one sitting. I love books like this and I’m so glad to have found it.
It’s publication timing was perfect – what better comfort read during the early, scary, uncertain days of the pandemic? It rewards rereading too!