People simply do not notice whatever great moments of history are being enacted around

From Slightly Foxed No. 49, Spring 2016. The Sadness of Mrs. Bridge by William Palmer, page 70. Summarizing the context of the novel under review.

Mrs. Bridge lives in a wealthy suburb of Kansas City, inhabited by respectable and well-off families, most of whom vote Republican in a United States recently carried by a landslide victory by Roosevelt and the Democrats. The Depression hardly affects the Bridges and their neighbours. Their only contact with black people is to employ them as servants, and those servants go home at night to parts of the city the Bridges would not dream of visiting. The genius of Connell is to show that this is how most people live: first in their own minds, then in their families, then in their limited social circles; most historical novels fail to realize that most people simply do not notice whatever great moments of history are being enacted around them unless they actually impinge upon their lives.