Ooooh, thank you! I was hoping you could articulate this stuff for me and you did!
This is it exactly:
Upper-class people who are obsessed with the importance of class are fools with the wrong priorities, but GOOD upper-class people, who are just naturally wonderful people but don't put on airs, are obviously the best kind of people.
and
So I think you're right that it's priorities that Ibbotson is snobbish about, and that she sees caring too much about being aristocratic/wealthy/well-born is a bad priority, but I think she does still see being those things as being inherently superior as long as you have the right priorities.
YUP.
Oh, I couldn't make it through the short stories, either, though I didn't get as far as that one. Horrific. There's one adult book she wrote that's entirely set in Vienna and I was so torn about it because I loooooved the local color and the sentences so much...but the gender stuff! The main character was the mistress of a man whose wife was not sufficiently feminine or understanding or loving enough, so of course she deserved to be cheated on! And of course the man deserved to cheat! How could he not, when his wife wasn't providing enough emotional support???? GROSS, EVA!
no subject
This is it exactly:
Upper-class people who are obsessed with the importance of class are fools with the wrong priorities, but GOOD upper-class people, who are just naturally wonderful people but don't put on airs, are obviously the best kind of people.
and
So I think you're right that it's priorities that Ibbotson is snobbish about, and that she sees caring too much about being aristocratic/wealthy/well-born is a bad priority, but I think she does still see being those things as being inherently superior as long as you have the right priorities.
YUP.
Oh, I couldn't make it through the short stories, either, though I didn't get as far as that one. Horrific. There's one adult book she wrote that's entirely set in Vienna and I was so torn about it because I loooooved the local color and the sentences so much...but the gender stuff! The main character was the mistress of a man whose wife was not sufficiently feminine or understanding or loving enough, so of course she deserved to be cheated on! And of course the man deserved to cheat! How could he not, when his wife wasn't providing enough emotional support???? GROSS, EVA!