Pension boon

[teamsaint]

That's coz we're cool and laid-back. You guys get so excited about coming here, you can't wait!

Love going there, love getting out .

[vinteuil]

Love going there, love getting out .

Love being here, love getting out - occasionally; love getting back

[aeolium]

... do you think so? For me one of the serious weaknesses of Dickens is that he never really describes the real world of work - except his extreme (I wd say sentimentalized) take on crossing sweepers and his self image as sufferer in the blacking factory. Whereas Thackeray, Mrs Gaskell, Trollope get into the skin of all sorts of trades ( in the way that Balzac can do ) . But I wd be happy to be corrected.

But you could go through Dickens' novels (and works like Sketches of Boz) and tot up the sheer number of different occupations of different characters, many of which are described at least in part. It is not his objective to go into detail about the nature of work for its own sake, but only in so far as it advances story, theme or character portrayal. Has any novelist in any language portrayed so many different types of occupation (as well as, of course, the numerous variations of unemployment, beggary, workhouse poverty, indebtedness)?

[Flosshilde]

Yes; I think that one of Dickens' strengths is the way he does describe the life of working (and destitute) people. They might be grotesques, but then so are his other characters. What other authors do so, or to such an extent? Jane Austen (not a contemporary), as well as ignoring the war with France ignores the working class. Mrs Gaskell does, I believe (I've not read any of her books), but not many others.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

... it's just that when I lived in Calcutta, the inhabitants regularly said that of old it was "the second city of the Empire".

I think Liverpool, Dublin, and Philadelphia (!) have also claimed this dubious title.

Whereas in Leeds, they've always known.


It was London.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Jane Austen (not a contemporary), as well as ignoring the war with France ignores the working class.

????!!!!!!

What do you think all those soldiers and sailors in her novels were doing?!

[Flosshilde]

I'm (possibly mis-) remembering a criticism I read (possibly in an introduction to the Penguin edition of one of her novels) that she ignored the war with France. Yes, there are plenty of soldiers, but not much reference to what they were for (except seducing young girls).

[P. G. Tipps]

... it's just that when I lived in Calcutta, the inhabitants regularly said that of old it was "the second city of the Empire".

I think Liverpool, Dublin, and Philadelphia (!) have also claimed this dubious title.

In their dreams!

The Scots ran the Empire and only they had the authority to award dubious titles ...

[jean]

The bus service in London is wonderful compared to the rest of the UK

Deregulation was a disaster for bus services outside London. As so often, Thatcher did not apply the policies she trumpeted elsewhere in her own back yard.

[jean]

Whereas in Leeds, they've always known.

It was London.

Sorry, that's an old Liverpool joke.

[ahinton]

Deregulation was a disaster for bus services outside London. As so often, Thatcher did not apply the policies she trumpeted elsewhere in her own back yard.

I sometimes wonder how some bus services in rural areas even manage to function at all. I don't use them because the nearest one is a more than a 2 mile drive away and then to get into the nearest city one one takes almost three times as long as it does to drive. I have no idea what the fares are, but whenever I see one of these buses on the road it's invariably empty or almost empty unless it's a school bus. How the company that runs these services manages to keep afloat I have no idea, unless they're being paid a not so small fortune to ply the school runs (over which they appear to have a local monopoly).

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Deregulation was a disaster for bus services outside London. As so often, Thatcher did not apply the policies she trumpeted elsewhere in her own back yard.

It was the same with the London Underground when railways were privatised.

[Flosshilde]

Deregulation was a disaster for bus services outside London. As so often, Thatcher did not apply the policies she trumpeted elsewhere in her own back yard.

Interestingly Edinburgh Council retained control of its buses. First Bus are making some inroads, but the majority of services are still Lothian Buses. I don't know how they managed that.

[ahinton]

Interestingly Edinburgh Council retained control of its buses. First Bus are making some inroads, but the majority of services are still Lothian Buses. I don't know how they managed that.

Well, I suppose that it could be possible in a capital city but I couldn't imagine that happening in Hereford; I imagine that council taxpayers would be up in arms in protest at being expected to pay for loss-making rural services that are scarcely used, unless these are somehow heavily subsidised.

[Flosshilde]

But weren't most bus services council-owned (and presumably subsidised) before deregulation? And I think that uneconomic services (most of them) run by private companies receive some subsidies?