"At 30 there is no chance that she will have any of the certainties that we enjoyed but maybe my grandchildren will.
Gone are the old certainties of how decisions were made "by having lunch with an MP, or taking a journalist out," laments one.
Maybe if only to give me a platform from which to reject a lot of the things youre taught as certainties.
"Since 2008, lots of things have been turned on their heads for people: old certainties are not certainties any more.
He found great strength in the moral certainties of Catholicism.
Nevertheless it's worth reflecting that whatever the certainties of the campaigns, nobody can be sure what happens next, in the short or long term.
After a month on the road, all I can say for sure is that the certainties of the second half of the 20th century are dying in front of our eyes.
That often means people retreat towards local certainties, simple certitudes".
Even that is not clear except to those who thrive on simple certainties, in this case the crude but high-tech savagery of Israeli attacks on civilian-dense Gaza, not all of which loves its Hamas rulers.
A sense of a change of class barriers, of government, of expectations, of certainties, that was probably, at times, brutal.
Walter counts himself part of the village community, but – appropriately for a book that is all about power and belonging and ownership – will find himself alienated from gentlemen and labourers alike when the timeless certainties of village life are overturned.
