Set in late 19th-century Paris, The Ladies’ Paradise portrays a society made up of distinct social classes. Denise and her brothers arrive in Paris in “the third-class carriage,” with no money or importance. Above them, there are small businessowners like the Baudus, and finally the remnants of the aristocracy, such as Madame Desforges and Madame de Boves. In this highly stratified society, the Ladies’ Paradise—Mouret’s big department store—brings all the classes together and begins to dissolve the distinctions between them. The Ladies’ Paradise, in appealing to what Mouret suggests are women’s universal desires, creates a space in which high- and low-class ladies shop together. In particular, the novel describes the upper-class ladies as being unable to resist a sale or a deal—and so those ladies often end up buying the same things as their lower-class counterparts, further muddying the distinctions between classes.
Additionally, the Ladies’ Paradise provides employees a new opportunity to rise in class. Denise, who begins the novel impoverished, ultimately rises to the prestigious position of buyer in the ladieswear department, defying both the restrictions of her class and gender. Mouret himself, as founder of the Ladies’ Paradise, was nothing but “an adventurer” when he arrived in Paris and became wealthy through work alone. In his store, he creates an environment that enables others to enjoy the same kind of growth. His commission-based system recreates “the struggle for existence,” in which his salespeople—men and women, rich and poor—compete with one another to earn the most and rise to the most prominent positions. However, those who stubbornly stick to their class fail. The Baudus refuse to be flexible in their position in society and refuse to embrace modern business models, which do away with class distinctions altogether—so ultimately, they lower their class when they become poor. The Ladies’ Paradise thus suggests that dissolving rigid class distinctions is how 19th-century Parisians of all classes are able to find success that previous generations never dreamed of. On the other hand, clinging tightly to outdated ideas about class and mobility will likely lead to failure.
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Class and Mobility Quotes in The Ladies’ Paradise
He would give [his salesmen] a percentage on […] the smallest article they sold: a system which had caused a revolution in the drapery trade by creating among the assistants a struggle for survival from which the employers reaped the benefit. […] [Mouret] unleashed passions, brought different forces into conflict, let the strong devour the weak, and grew fat on this battle of interests.
It was a secret war, in which the girls themselves participated with as much ferocity as [the men] did; and, in their common fatigue, always on their feet as they were, dead tired, differences of sex disappeared and nothing remained but opposing interests inflamed by the fever of business.
They were all nothing but cogs, caught up in the workings of the machine, surrendering their personalities, merely adding their strength to the mighty common whole of the phalanstery.
It was easy; they said everyone did it in the end because in Paris a woman could not live on what she earned. But her whole being revolted against it; she felt no indignation against others for giving in, but simply an aversion to anything dirty or senseless. She considered life a matter of logic, good conduct, and courage.
By this time, there were thirty-nine departments and eighteen hundred employees, of whom two hundred were women. A whole world was springing up amidst the life echoing beneath the high metal naves.
There were all sorts, hussies as well as decent girls. What is more, their moral standard was rising. In the past they had had nothing but the dregs of the trade, poor distracted girls who just drifted into the drapery business; […] in short, when they wanted to behave properly, they could; […] The worst thing of all was their neutral, ill-defined position, somewhere between shopkeepers and ladies. Plunged into the midst of luxury, often without any previous education, they formed an anonymous class apart.
Was it humane or right, this appalling consumption of human flesh every year by the big shops? She would plead the cause of the cogs in this great machine, but with arguments based on the employers’ own interests. When one wants a sound machine, one uses good metal; if the metal breaks or is broken there’s a stoppage of work, repeated expense in getting it started again, a considerable wastage of energy.
