Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont

Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont is a novel by Elizabeth Taylor. Published in 1971, it was her eleventh novel. It was shortlisted for the 1971 Booker Prize. The novel was adapted for television in 1973 and was the basis for a 2005 film, also called Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont. Plot The novel is set in London in the 1960s. The story takes place between January and late autumn of a single year. The recently widowed Laura Palfrey moves into the Claremont Hotel, where she joins a group of other elderly hotel residents. She has a daughter in Scotland and a grandson, Desmond, who lives in London and works at the British Museum. Having told the other residents that she has a grandson who will be visiting her, she is embarrassed by his failure to do so. One afternoon she slips and falls on the pavement. Ludo Myers, a young man who lives in a basement apartment, sees her fall and helps her, taking her in, bandaging her cut leg, and calling a taxi to take her home. Ludo is an impoverished aspiring novelist who spends his days writing in the Banking Hall at Harrods in order to save money on heat. To thank him, Mrs. Palfrey invites Ludo to dinner at the Claremont the following week. When she tells the waiter at the Claremont she is expecting a guest for dinner on Saturday, one of the other residents overhears and assumes that the visitor will be Mrs. Palfrey's grandson Desmond. Rather than correct her, Mrs. Palfrey seeks out Ludo at Harrods and asks him to pretend to be her grandson. The dinner is a success and Ludo and Mrs. Palfrey become friends, although he is also interested in her as a source for a novel he is writing.