Only it isn't easy to stand up for yourself when you feel there's nothing and nobody at your back.
 Joseph Conrad, Victory: An Island Tale (1915). copy citation

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Author Joseph Conrad
Source Victory: An Island Tale
Topic feeling
Date 1915
Language English
Reference
Note
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/6378/6378-h/6378-h.htm

Context

“What can you expect? Only this evening, after supper, he—but I slipped away. You don't mind him, do you? Why, I could face him myself now that I know you care for me. A girl can always put up a fight. You believe me? Only it isn't easy to stand up for yourself when you feel there's nothing and nobody at your back. There's nothing so lonely in the world as a girl who has got to look after herself. When I left poor dad in that home—it was in the country, near a village—I came out of the gates with seven shillings and threepence in my old purse, and my railway ticket.” source