A Little Dinner at Timmins's

Thackeray turns his merciless eye on the aspiring middle class in this biting novella about a couple bitten by social ambition. Mr. and Mrs. Fitzroy Timmins, newlyweds, he a struggling barrister, she a woman of grand aspirations, decide to host a dinner that will announce their arrival in London society. The guest list is impeccable: an Earl and Countess, wealthy neighbors, the sort of people who might grant them entry into the world they crave. There's only one problem: they cannot afford it. What follows is a masterfully observed comedy of pretension and panic. As the dinner approaches, Mr. Timmins's overdrawn accounts multiply like a nightmare, while Mrs. Timmins compounds the disaster with her enthusiasm and total ignorance of practical matters. The evening itself unfolds as a cascade of social faux pas and mounting humiliations. Thackeray, who knew a thing or two about Victorian society's obsession with status, skewers the futile economics of keeping up appearances with precision and glee. The result is a sharp, funny portrait of people who want desperately to be someone they're not, and the price they pay for the illusion.