The People of the Abyss

An influential 1903 account of life among London's poorest East End residents at the dawn of the twentieth century.

Jack London (Author)

9781108064552, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 22 August 2013

390 pages, 24 b/w illus.
21.6 x 14 x 2.2 cm, 0.49 kg

In the summer of 1902, respected American author Jack London (1876–1916), previously known for his descriptions of life during the Klondike Gold Rush, spent two months living 'down by the docks' in London's East End among the city's poorest residents. During this time he often slept in workhouses or on the streets, seeing first-hand how the impoverished struggled daily for adequate food, clothing and shelter while the rest of the city lived in relative prosperity - a prosperity which the author believed was gained at the expense of the poor. One of the earliest eyewitness descriptions of life in the slums of London, this book would influence later socially minded authors such as George Orwell. The text is also illustrated with photographs of the places and people mentioned, offering an important insight into the living conditions of the poor at the dawn of the twentieth century.

Preface
1. The descent
2. Johnny Upright
3. My lodging and some others
4. A man and the abyss
5. Those on the edge
6. Frying-Pan Alley and a glimpse of the inferno
7. A winner of the Victoria Cross
8. The carter and the carpenter
9. The spike
10. Carrying the banner
11. The peg
12. Coronation day
13. Dan Cullen, docker
14. Hops and hoppers
15. The sea wife
16. Property v. person
17. Inefficiency
18. Wages
19. The ghetto
20. Coffee-houses and doss-houses
21. The precariousness of life
22. Suicide
23. The children
24. A vision of the night
25. The hunger wail
26. Drink, temperance and thrift
27. The management.

Subject Areas: British & Irish history [HBJD1]