{"id":5165,"date":"2017-02-26T17:33:38","date_gmt":"2017-02-26T06:33:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/?p=5165"},"modified":"2017-02-26T19:18:46","modified_gmt":"2017-02-26T08:18:46","slug":"growing-up-gracefully-part-three","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/2017\/02\/growing-up-gracefully-part-three\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Growing Up Gracefully\u2019, Part Three"},"content":{"rendered":"

Each chapter of Growing Up Gracefully<\/em><\/a> has a short introduction by Noel Streatfeild and her introduction to \u2018Manners Abroad\u2019 contains the following sage advice for those travelling to Australia:<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember being surprised when, on my arrival at Menzies Hotel in Melbourne, the lift-boy took my book from under my arm, read the title, and said casually, \u2018I\u2019ll have a read of that when you\u2019re through.\u2019 But a very short time spent in Australia showed me his were not bad manners, as I had first supposed, but merely new manners with which I was not familiar. The boy was asserting in a friendly way that he might be a lift-boy, and I a guest in the hotel, but we had tastes in common.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Miss Streatfeild also experienced some differences between British and American manners:<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the freedoms on which Americans most pride themselves, for which, in fact, many of their forebears left the lands of their birth to become Americans, is the right to speak their minds on any and every subject \u2026 We may sometimes think more guarded speech would be better manners, but Americans do not feel like that. They believe speaking out is good manners, and keeping your thoughts to yourself hypocrisy. Maybe they are right. But right or wrong, what we consider good manners when abroad remains unchanged, so whatever we may think of foreigners and their countries we must Keep Our Thoughts To Ourselves.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"'Manners<\/p>\n

Miss Virginia Graham then provides lots of useful hints for travelling abroad, which can often be challenging:<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of irritating things will happen to you when you are overseas, and you will feel rather superior and will long to say to somebody that at home we manage these things much better…\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

However, you must remember that foreigners don\u2019t like hearing their countries criticised and can often understand English:<\/p>\n

\u201cSo accept your sausageless continental breakfast with a smile, enquire, more as if you were seeking information than complaining, why it is that when you pull the plug nothing happens, tip with grace, wait quietly for those trains which never come.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

She explains how to manage tipping and taxis, how to clean your clothes and order breakfast in a hotel, how to manage cutlery in France and cheese in Holland and bathrooms in Italy, and how to avoid dropped bricks (\u201cAlthough you are probably too young to remember much about the last war, it is quite a good thing to know which side the country you are in was on \u2026\u201d). <\/p>\n

After that comes Mr Sidney Form\u2019s \u2018Guests and Hosts’. In her introduction, Miss Streatfeild takes a moment to rejoice in the evolution of manners since the war:<\/p>\n

\u201cA mother, as it might be your own, calling on a friend\u2019s mother in calling-card days, had to leave three cards \u2013 one of her own and two of her husband\u2019s. If it happened that the called-on was a widow, she only left two cards, one of her own and one of her husband\u2019s. In any case, however many cards she left, she had to turn down the right-hand corners inwards, to show she had delivered the cards herself and not sent a servant with them. This turning down corners ritual went on even though the people on whom the mother called knew perfectly well there was either no servant, or the one that existed had far better things to do than going round delivering calling-cards…\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

However, there are still difficulties to be overcome when hosting parties, says Mr Form. He thinks big parties are easier, because you can hold them outside your home, invite everyone you know, and let the caterers deal with the food, drink and clean-up. Small parties require skill when selecting the guest list (he advises you to find a celebrity and \u201cimplore him or her to attend\u201d) and you might need to make it a cocktail or sherry party (if you have a lot of drab guests with nothing much in common, \u201cclearly they won\u2019t be an easy lot to get going at square-dancing\u201d).<\/p>\n

There are also challenges when guests stay overnight in your home, beginning with the state of your guest room (\u201cwhere no member of the family has slept in them they do not know its horrors\u201d). Then when the guests arrive, they will need to be entertained. Some hosts declare, \u2018You must take us as you find us\u2019, which is fine as long as the regular household routine is sufficiently organised and amusing. Others set up a strict and stressful activity schedule. Mr Fine believes that \u201cperfect hosts are those who entertain tactfully, but not too much.\u201d He also provides advice for house guests, including how to escape when necessary (fake an illness or arrange for a friend to telephone about an \u2018emergency\u2019).<\/p>\n

\"'Take<\/p>\n

Miss Marghanita Laski then discusses \u2018How Eccentric May I Be?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cBy the time you come to read this book, the question is probably settled; you\u2019re either going to accept the world as you find it or else to reject it \u2013 perhaps to make a better one and perhaps not. Both rebels and conformers are necessary. Both can be the salt of the earth, and both can be the most intolerable nuisances and bores.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Rebellion is the natural state of young people, she believes, although she distinguishes between rebellion against the previous generation\u2019s rules and true eccentricity, which is rare:<\/p>\n

\u201cA real eccentric is a person so much divorced from the social life around him or her that the opinion of others doesn\u2019t matter at all. He directs his life entirely by his own thoughts and wishes which seldom happen in any way to coincide with the thoughts and wishes of other people. By the lights of the world, he is almost certainly a madman. He may be a mad genius, like Blake, or he may just be mad. It is to the highest degree improbable that this is the kind of eccentric you are.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In fact, a lot of \u2018rebellious\u2019 teenagers are simply copying each other (\u2018Teddie-boys\u2019 are again used as an example). But if you come into conflict with your parents about say, your religious or political opinions, she advises that you first determine whether you know<\/em> you are absolutely right in your beliefs. If so, then it\u2019s up to you to decide:<\/p>\n

\u201cWill you save your own conscience at the cost of outraging theirs, even if it\u2019s only outraging some purely social value that they believe to be a matter of conscience? Or will you decide to conform outwardly rather than upset them, in which case your own conscience is in no danger at all, and you\u2019re undoubtedly an unusually kind and mature young person?\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Often parents are concerned about your choice of friends, or your clothes, or whether you drink or swear or read certain books, because they worry it will lead you to become an unhappy adult, rejected by society as \u201cimmoral or criminal or grossly irresponsible\u201d. Perhaps you are right or perhaps they are. Perhaps they refuse to compromise. Regardless, you have a right to your own views, but also a duty to ensure they are thoughtful views of your own, not copied from those you admire or put on to outrage those you dislike. Miss Laski concludes with her answer to the question of how eccentric you may be:<\/p>\n

\u201cAs eccentric as you can reasonably manage without permanently damaging yourself or gratuitously hurting other people.\u201d <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As for the practicalities of this, perhaps they are dealt with in the next section, which includes a chapter on \u2018When and When Not to Make a Fuss\u2019.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Each chapter of Growing Up Gracefully has a short introduction by Noel Streatfeild and her introduction to \u2018Manners Abroad\u2019 contains the following sage advice for those travelling to Australia: \u201cI remember being surprised when, on my arrival at Menzies Hotel in Melbourne, the lift-boy took my book from under my arm, read the title, and … Continue reading \u2018Growing Up Gracefully\u2019, Part Three<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,6,11],"tags":[54],"class_list":["post-5165","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1950s-and-1960s","category-books","category-young-adult","tag-noel-streatfeild"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5165","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5165"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5165\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5171,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5165\/revisions\/5171"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}