FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146  
147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   >>   >|  
ant soul and Ghetto greed, this fool's "efficiency," that rules our world to-day. Then Susan lunged for a time at the waitress life her sister led. "She has 'er 'ome with us, but some--they haven't homes." "They make a fuss about all this White Slave Traffic," said Susan, "but if ever there were white slaves it's the girls who work for a living and keep themselves respectable. And nobody wants to make an example of the men who get rich out of _them_...." And after some hearsay about the pressure in the bake-houses and the accidents to the van-men, who worked on a speeding-up system that Sir Isaac had adopted from an American business specialist, Susan's mental discharge poured out into the particulars of the waitresses' strike and her sister's share in that. "She _would_ go into it," said Susan, "she let herself be drawn in. I asked her never to take the place. Better Service, I said, a thousand times. I begged her, I could have begged her on my bended knees...." The immediate cause of the strike it seemed was the exceptional disagreeableness of one of the London district managers. "He takes advantage of his position," repeated Susan with face aflame, and Lady Harman was already too wise about Susan's possibilities to urge her towards particulars.... Now as Lady Harman listened to all this confused effective picturing of the great catering business which was the other side of her husband and which she had taken on trust so long, she had in her heart a quite unreasonable feeling of shame that she should listen at all, a shyness, as though she was prying, as though this really did not concern her. She knew she had to listen and still she felt beyond her proper jurisdiction. It is against instinct, it is with an enormous reluctance that women are bringing their quick emotions, their flashing unstable intelligences, their essential romanticism, their inevitable profound generosity into the world of politics and business. If only they could continue believing that all that side of life is grave and wise and admirably managed for them they would. It is not in a day or a generation that we shall un-specialize women. It is a wrench nearly as violent as birth for them to face out into the bleak realization that the man who goes out for them into business, into affairs, and returns so comfortably loaded with housings and wrappings and trappings and toys, isn't, as a matter of fact, engaged in benign creativeness while
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146  
147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
business
 

strike

 

particulars

 
Harman
 

listen

 

sister

 

begged

 

jurisdiction

 

proper

 

possibilities


concern

 
husband
 

effective

 
picturing
 
catering
 

shyness

 

prying

 

listened

 

unreasonable

 

feeling


confused

 

romanticism

 

realization

 

affairs

 

returns

 
specialize
 

wrench

 

violent

 

comfortably

 

loaded


engaged

 

benign

 
creativeness
 

matter

 

housings

 

wrappings

 

trappings

 

unstable

 

flashing

 

intelligences


essential
 
emotions
 

enormous

 

instinct

 

reluctance

 
bringing
 

inevitable

 
profound
 
admirably
 

managed