Class : a guide through the American status system

201 Pages·1983·60.129 MB·English

by  Paul Fussell

AUTHOR OF BAD OR, THE DUMBING OF AMERICA
A GUIDE
THROUGH THE
AMERICAN
STATUS
SYSTEM
"HIGHLY AMUSiNG ....
A WITTY, PERSNICKETY,
AND ILLUMINATING BOOK ....
FUSSELL HITS THE MARK."
- CHICAGO SUN-TIMES
CLASS
A Guide Through
the
American Status System
PAUL FUSSELL
With illustrations by Martim de Avillez
A TOUCHSTONE BOOK
Published by Simon & Schuster
New York London Toronto Sydney Tokyo Singapore
711'
TOUCHSTONE
Rockefeller Center
1230 A venue of the Americas
New York, New York 10020
Copyright © 1983 by Paul Fussell
All rights reserved
including the right of reproduction
in whole or in part in any form.
First Touchstone Edition 1992
TOUCHSTONE and colophon are registered trademarks
of Simon & Schuster Inc.
Manufactured in the United States of America
9 10
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.
ISBN 0-671-44991-5
ISBN 0-671-79225-3 (pbk.)
"Aberdarcy: The Main Square" from Collected Poems, 1944-1979 by
Kingsley Amis, copyright © 1979 by Kingsley Amis. Reprinted by
permission of Viking Penguin, Inc.
"Come with Me" from The Light Around the Body by Robert Bly,
copyright © 1964 by Robert Bly. Reprinted by permission ofH arper &
Row, Publishers, Inc.
Acknowledgments
I am grateful to the many people who have interested themselves
in this project or who have-sometimes inadvertently-supplied
me with data. Especially helpful have been James Anderson, Jack
Beatty, Jake Blumenthal, Henry E. Bradshaw, Alfred Bush, Ed
ward T. Cone, Theodore and Mary Cross, Kit Davies, Ira and
Judy Davis, Eileen Fallon, Betty Fussell, Angeline Goreau, John
Hutchinson, David Johnson, Patrick J. and Marian Kelleher, Mi
chael Kinsley, Fletcher and Laura Berquist Knebel, Don Kowet,
A. Walton Litz, Donald and Fleury Mackie, Anthony Manousos,
Edgar Mayhew, Joyce Carol Oates, George Pitcher, Miles Rind,
James Silberman, Claude M. Spilman, Jr., Brian Stratton, Rod
Townley, and Alan Williams. During work on this book I have
enjoyed the friendship of Harriette Behringer and John Scanlan. I
want to thank both for their generosity.

To .
TUcky and Sam

Contents
A Touchy Subject 15
II An Anatomy of the Classes 24
III Appearance Counts 51
IV About the House 76
V Consumption, Recreation, Bibelots 97
VI The Life of the Mind 128
VII "Speak, That I May See Thee" 151
VIII Climbing and Sinking, and Prole Drift 170
IX The X Way Out 179
Appendix: Exercises, and the Mail Bag 189