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manners

A controversial recent book suggests that what we think of as good manners is a relatively new thing, a commodity manufactured to meet the needs of an industrial age. But, now that the Industrial Revolution is over, we may need them more than ever, for very different reasons.

All of us have encountered surly check-out cashiers, come up against uncivil civil servants, and witnessed rude public behavior. The couple behind us who talk through the entire movie. The stranger who lets the shop door slam in our face.

You entered it only rarely, and you weren’t meant to be comfortable there. But every house had to have one, no matter how high the cost

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