Bargains in the street

Text 1: The Saturday Night Market, by Henry Mallender

An original newspaper report written in a nineteenth-century voice; a period simulation, not an archival document.

Let the reader who has never seen a Saturday night market imagine a street half a mile long, lit from end to end by flaring naphtha lamps, and filled from wall to wall with buyers and sellers who appear to be engaged in a contest to see which can shout the loudest. “Here’s your fine Yarmouth bloaters!” cries one; “Penny a lot, penny a lot!” roars another; and a boy with a tray of combs has a voice which might be heard at Greenwich.

Everything is for sale. We counted, within a hundred yards, odd boots, cracked teapots, second-hand bonnets, live eels, and a looking-glass with no glass in it. Nor is any price fixed. A woman before us beat a costermonger down from fourpence to twopence-halfpenny for a cabbage, and both parties seemed perfectly satisfied with the exchange.

It would be easy to laugh at such a scene, but we did not. These are the wives of working men, paid late on Saturday, who must make a few shillings feed a family until the next. For them the market is not an amusement; it is the week’s great battle, fought with sharp eyes and a sharper tongue.

Text 2: Sunday Morning at the Car Boot, by Kerry Ashworth

An original contemporary blog.

If you have never been to a car boot sale at seven o’clock on a Sunday morning, picture a muddy field, two hundred cars with their boots flung open, and the sound of a hundred people all saying “How much is this?” at once. A man with a megaphone is selling cleaning products. A little girl is selling her own drawings for ten pence each and doing very well.

The stuff is gloriously random. This week I saw a fondue set, a box of VHS tapes, a stuffed owl, three left-footed football boots and a framed photograph of somebody else’s wedding. Nothing has a price on it, which is the point. I watched a pensioner talk a lad down from five pounds to two for a toaster, and they shook hands like diplomats.

People love to make fun of car boots, but plenty of the buyers are not there for fun. I see the same young mums every week buying school shoes and coats their kids will outgrow by spring. For them it is not a hobby. It is how the budget stretches to the end of the month.

Both writers describe a busy street market or sale.

What are the similarities between the writers’ impressions of the market and the people who use it?

Draw on evidence from both texts to support your answer.