Those comfortably padded lunatic asylums which are known, euphemistically, as the stately homes of England.
Much of what is today called "social criticism" consists of members of the upper classes denouncing the tastes of the lower classes (bawdy entertainment, fast food, plentiful consumer goods) while considering themselves egalitarians.
I'm someone who can create critiques of individuals based on their economic history. That's one way I look at people in terms of one story that could be told purely in a Marxist construction.
So (if) some cracker come and tell you 'Well, my mother and father blood go back to the Mayflower,' you better hold your pocket. That ain't nothing to be proud of. That means their forefathers was crooks.
The bourgeoisie is very fond of so-called practical types and novels with happy endings, since they soothe it with the idea that one can both accumulate capital and preserve innocence, be a beast and at the same time be happy...
On a level plain, simple mounds look like hills; and the insipid flatness of our present bourgeoisie is to be measured by the altitude of its great intellects.
If you wanted to show a mirror to people that says, 'You've been drunk on money,' they're not going to want to see it. But if you reflected that mirror on another time they'd be willing to. People will need an explanation of where we are and where we've been, and 'The Great Gatsby' can provide that explanation.
These awful middle-class queens - which is what the gay movement has become - are so tiresome. It's all Abercrombie & Fitch and strollers.
Poverty, Poetry, and new Titles of Honor, make Men ridiculous
Ivy Hisselpenny was the unfortunate victim of circumstances that dictated she be only-just-pretty, only-just-wealthy, and possessed of a terrible propensity for wearing extremely silly hats.
If you're mocking anyone, make sure it's those at the top of the food chain, not the bottom.
The life of our class, of the wealthy and the learned, was not only repulsive to me but had lost all meaning. The sum of our action and thinking, of our science and art, all of it struck me as the overindulgences of a spoiled child.
There's always been this tradition of satirizing these rich groups of people.
