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Down and Out in Paris and London (Penguin Modern Classics) [Paperback]

George Orwell (Author)
4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (48 customer reviews)
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Product details

  • Paperback: 256 pages
  • Publisher: Penguin Classics; New Ed edition (27 Sep 2001)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0141184388
  • ISBN-13: 978-0141184388
  • Product Dimensions: 20.2 x 13.2 x 1.6 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (48 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,419 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
    #1 in  Books > Biography > Historical > Britain > Social & Urban History
    #1 in  Books > Biography > Historical > Countries & Regions > France
    #1 in  Books > History > Europe > France

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More About the Author

George Orwell
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Product Description

Product Description

‘You have talked so often of going to the dogs – and well, here are the dogs, and you have reached them.’ George Orwell’s vivid memoir of his time among the desperately poor and destitute in London and Paris is a moving tour of the underworld of society. Here he painstakingly documents a world of unrelenting drudgery and squalor – sleeping in bug-infested hostels and doss houses, working as a dishwasher in the vile ‘Hôtel X’, living alongside tramps, surviving on scraps and cigarette butts – in an unforgettable account of what being down and out is really like.

About the Author

Eric Arthur Blair (George Orwell) was born in 1903 in India, where his father worked for the Civil Service. The family moved to England in 1907 and in 1917 Orwell entered Eton, where he contributed regularly to the various college magazines. From 1922 to 1927 he served with the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, an experience that inspired his first novel, Burmese Days (1934). Several years of poverty followed. He lived in Paris for two years before returning to England, where he worked successively as a private tutor, schoolteacher and bookshop assistant, and contributed reviews and articles to a number of periodicals. Down and Out in Paris and London was published in 1933. In 1936 he was commissioned by Victor Gollancz to visit areas of mass unemployment in Lancashire and Yorkshire, and The Road to Wigan Pier (1937) is a powerful description of the poverty he saw there. At the end of 1936 Orwell went to Spain to fight for the Republicans and was wounded. Homage to Catalonia is his account of the civil war. He was admitted to a sanatorium in 1938 and from then on was never fully fit. He spent six months in Morocco and there wrote Coming Up for Air. During the Second World War he served in the Home Guard and worked for the BBC Eastern Service from 1941 to 1943. As literary editor of the Tribune he contributed a regular page of political and literary commentary, and he also wrote for the Observer and later for the Manchester Evening News. His unique political allegory, Animal Farm was published in 1945, and it was this novel, together with Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), which brought him world-wide fame. George Orwell died in London in January 1950.
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Customer Reviews

48 Reviews
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 (17)
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Average Customer Review
4.5 out of 5 stars (48 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A sobering book, 30 Jan 2007
By DangermouseZilla "He's the strongest, he's th... (Doncaster, Yorkshire, UK.) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 50 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Down and Out in Paris and London (Penguin Modern Classics) (Paperback)
George Orwell felt awkward for being middle class, once he started to make a bit of money as an author this added to his awkwardness and he spent a lot of time in dank and impoverished surroundings.

This book is largely autobiographic, it tells of his time spent with the homeless. Orwell would pretend to be a tramp, not just pretend - he would live as a tramp from time to time. It was his time as a tramp that feed the ideas in this book.

Orwell writes about the camaraderie in the tramp community with warmth, you can feel his fondness for the people he is writing about.

The tramp experience covers only the second part of the book.

The first part describes the life of Parisian hotel/restaurant kitchen workers. It isn't glamorous. It is a life devoid of love, warmth, and happiness. Boris is the star of the "Paris" part of this book.

This is not only one of Orwell's finest pieces of work, it is a book that changes how you feel about life. When I read this book I was struggling financially - but this book put things in perspective, and I still imagine scenes in this book when times are hard.

The contrast between the "Paris" and "London" aspects of the book couldn't be more different, even though both are concerning that corner of society who seem to have nothing.

Read this book on the bus/train on the commute to work and you'll get lost in the dark visuals it inspires. The book had many place names and people's names removed for fear of being libellous, at first this seems clumsy but you get used to it.
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22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Poverty and dirt in the 1920s, 15 Feb 2003
By Alex Magpie "lexi_wades" - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   
This review is from: Down and Out in Paris and London (Essential Penguin) (Paperback)
One word to describe this book would be "grimy" although that does not convey the wonderful writing style of Orwell- perhaps "almost glamorous grime" would be better. Never have I read such a good book that describes the poverty, dirt and atmosphere of the early twentieth century. The café/hotel culture of Paris and sharing tiny rooms with an assortment of characters in Paris seems to come alive with wit and verve. Similarly the boarding houses and homeless hostels "spikes" in London are gloomier but no less interesting.
Orwell introduces us to many eccentric people without the sexual overstatement that flawed Miller's Tropic Of Cancer- also set in Paris. The detail of the work washing pots and cooking food in the bowels of hotels in France is an eye opener as is the treatment of the homeless in London. Among the day-to-day living Orwell gives us some fascinating facts such as the (lack of) hygiene in the most expensive Parisian restaurants and that there were almost no homeless females in the 1920's.
Orwell's style is always gripping and we can see the beginnings of what he was later to refine further into 1984 and Animal Farm among other works. This is an excellent read that I would recommend to all- it has a wonderful mix of character, style, atmosphere and fact that is irresistible.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Down and Out - read it, 9 Nov 2006
By Mr. A. J. Clabburn - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Down and Out in Paris and London (Penguin Modern Classics) (Paperback)
If ever there was a book deserving the title 'modern classic', this is it. A thought provoking and subtle collection of anecdotes that will make you laugh and out loud and balk at the extremes of poverty described in equal measure. The fact that Orwell avoides self indulgence and manages to evoke a genuine sense of compassion is truely remarkable and whatever your political orientation, having read this book it is hard to feel anything but respect for the man.

Despite its age, down and out still strikes a resonant chord in the modern world and while much has changed in the intervening years, there are still enough parralels with todays society to make you take stock of the world we live in.

I greatly enjoyed this book and recommend everyone to read it.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Auditioning for the Z Factor
George was the first to take the stairs and enter the basement world of the marginalised by walking through the tradesmans entrance. Read more
Published 9 days ago by Dr. Delvis Memphistopheles

5.0 out of 5 stars A good read
I've read this book before and still enjoyed it the second time around. Delivery was what I expected.
Published 1 month ago by Fifi

5.0 out of 5 stars Peerless insight into poverty
This book is Orwell's autobiographical account of life in the Paris slums and amongst London tramps. Read more
Published 1 month ago by AK

5.0 out of 5 stars Imagery,Imagery,Imagery
I have read nearly everything by Orwell but this is by far my favourite!The imagery is quite amazing.The senses are thwarted all the time. Read more
Published 3 months ago by Derek Marten

4.0 out of 5 stars Not bad for a "travel diary"
I bought this book because, rather than watching mindless drivel on TV on an evening, I thought I'd read a few classics. Read more
Published 6 months ago by T. Duffy

5.0 out of 5 stars down & out in Paris & London
One of the best books I have read in a long time shame it was so short
Published 8 months ago by M. Clark

4.0 out of 5 stars Its a hard world - thankfully no more
This is a real eye opener on what it was like to be poor in London and Paris in the 1930s. It's a world away from the comfortable lives the vast majority of us have now, in the... Read more
Published 9 months ago by bouncee

4.0 out of 5 stars A Good Social Commentary
This book is written from Orwell's real life experiences in the two cities of the title. It is quite gritty and hard but offers an invaluable portrayal of how the bare existence... Read more
Published 16 months ago by I. M. Knight

4.0 out of 5 stars Not his finest but still worth the read
Despite its autobiographical nature this book is perhaps the least powerful of all Orwell's books that I have read so far. Read more
Published 24 months ago by Ibrahim Ali

5.0 out of 5 stars One of my favourite books
This is a beautiful piece of writing and a wonderful example of humanity. Orwell looks at some of the most downtrodden and neglected in society, lives with them and brings back... Read more
Published on 4 Aug 2008 by Three Heads Are Better Than One

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