Downton Abbey As “Parvenu-cracy’

“All of the Grantham daughters’ situations are a product of their status as hybrid creatures – all are the daughters of an heiress who cannot in turn be heiresses themselves. They are prevented from becoming their mother, and they know it … The story, then, is of an American matriarchal fortune wearing the court dress of a British patriarchy, and resenting it in ways it cannot quite express.”

Working-Class Scottish Author Won’t Take Any Crap From Bourgie Critics

James Kelman: “Obviously as a writer you have to reflect on why your work is provoking such hostility, because all you want to do is write your stories as best you can. You’re forced to reflect on, why is my work so upsetting for people? The agenda behind it is clear. They don’t want to see these people in literature. These areas of human experience [I write about] should not appear in public; we don’t want to know. We know that people are in the street, that they have no money and are maybe begging, but we don’t want to see them in literature. They should be swept under the carpet.”