Self-Help (Oxford World's Classics) [Paperback]

Much in Self-Help is still stimulating. Its central precept - the value of hard work, ingenuity, perseverance, thrift, a solid education - is in tune with American notions of workfare, not to mention the Labour party's espousal ... of a shift in the mission statement of the British social security system from 'hand-out' to 'hand-up'. Welfare financed by taxation is no longer chic. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

So far from a shallow exposition of 'economic man', Self-Help is an uplifting study of individual morality brought to life by personal examples. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

'The spirit of self-help is the root of all genuine growth in the individual; and, exhibited in the lives of many, it constitutes the true source of national vigour and strength.' A bestseller immediately after its publication in 1859, Self-Help propelled its author to fame and rapidly became one of Victorian Britain's most important statements on the allied virtues of hard work, thrift, and perseverance. Interpreted by some as a paean to personal avarice, Smiles's most celebrated book is in fact a practical and engaging tribute to the working- and lower-middle classes, in whom he identified the capacity for self-improvement and for whom he tirelessly advocated the right of social advancement. Part practical guide, part proverbial testament, part secular hagiography, this literary hybrid turns biography into an inspirational medium that awakens readers to their own potential and instils the desire to succeed. Smiles's book is the precursor of today's motivational and self-help literature, although its vision is significantly more cosmopolitan than that of most books in a still-expanding genre. This edition includes a fully indexed glossary to the more than 750 names discussed by Smiles.

SAMUEL SMILES (1812-1904) was born in Haddington in Scotland, the son of a paper maker. He was educated at Haddington High School and Edinburgh University, where he read medicine. He moved to Leeds in 1838 where he became editor of The Leeds Times, and campaigned for radical causes such as the repeal of the corn laws and the extension of the suffrage. He wrote a number of books, of which the most famous was SELF-HELP. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.