William Leith27 June 2013
Henry Hitchings, this paper’s theatre critic, turns his attention to the manners of the English. He’s terrific. He’s struck the perfect balance between hard academic insight and sheer readability — and achieves both. He tells us our fine distinctions of class have arisen from our circumstances — there are lots of people crammed into a small space: “By placing others, by putting them in particular compartments, we create more elbow room for ourselves”. He gets the essence of snobbery: “A driver in a Mercedes E350 looks down on a driver in a Mercedes E250 more than one in a KIA Picanto.”
