Nathan Connolly > Quotes

“much of class culture is about confidence. Confidence that might come easier to the middle and higher classes, while the working classes are constantly riddled with self-doubt and imposter syndrome.”
― Nathan Connolly, Know Your Place: Essays on the Working Class by the Working Class

“In medieval feudal thought, a person belonged where they were born. God, or some other deity, had ordained that everyone had their place, and to stray from it would be a sin. The modern era changed all that.”
― Nathan Connolly, Know Your Place: Essays on the Working Class by the Working Class

“there is more at stake when reading as working class. The propelling of the imagination into other worlds was – and still is – a lifeline.”
― Nathan Connolly, Know Your Place: Essays on the Working Class by the Working Class

“Poverty can make people feel like they don’t belong for the rest of their lives, even in moments when they can more easily count out the money.”
― Nathan Connolly, Know Your Place: Essays on the Working Class by the Working Class

“I think the reason working class people don’t write books is because they are encouraged to believe that only certain people are permitted to write books.’13”
― Nathan Connolly, Know Your Place: Essays on the Working Class by the Working Class

“deserving poor’, the culture of blame around poverty, extends into how our health problems are treated, and here it sticks out like a sore thumb: the working class are so tied up with castigation, that symptoms and causes of ill-health are punished before they’re treated.”
― Nathan Connolly, Know Your Place: Essays on the Working Class by the Working Class

“The tongue is an honest muscle, it never stays still. When you exercise it by speaking a certain way, it gets stronger and more versatile, but it always holds a memory of how it used to move. The ear, however, is sly.”
― Nathan Connolly, Know Your Place: Essays on the Working Class by the Working Class