Down and Out in Paris and London

Staff Pick

After graduating from Eton and serving five years as a member of the Imperial Police in Burma, George Orwell went slumming. Determined to overcome his inherited middle class mores, Orwell lived in abject poverty as a dishwasher and a vagrant. Down and Out in Paris and London is a slightly fictionalized account of his adventures, and was his debut as a writer. Given the weight of the issues explored in this book, what surprised me most was how much fun it was to read. There are far too many clever turns of phrase, unexpected truths, and outrageous wackos for this book to be a bummer.
Recommended by Liz, Powells.com

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egogrif, February 21, 2011 (view all comments by egogrif)
I started reading a battered little copy of this book when I couldn't find anything else lying around to read. Once I picked it up, I couldn't stop. It's very real and gritty, the sort of story you don't think you want to hear but can't stop listening to, the same way you might ogle in fascination at a train wreck. The author, quasi-autobiographically, plunges deeper and deeper into the ruined fringes of the civilized world, barely scraping together a living, describing every dreck and dive in intimate detail until you feel like you need to go take a shower. (It helped that my own copy was so dusty.) Yet no matter how pathetic his plight becomes, there is always the slightest tinge of humor, the hope that rock bottom has been hit at last. A memorable story; I don't think I will easily eat in a Parisian restaurant after reading this book!

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megcampbell3, February 23, 2008 (view all comments by megcampbell3)
Read the first half (down and out in Paris) of "Down and Out in Paris and London" in your favorite café or restaurant, and you might lose your appetite. Read the second half (down and out in London) on an empty stomach, and you might be better able to relate to the day in, day out hunger chronicled therein. This short read is labeled a novel, though it truly seems more an accounting, a diary—or a memoir of a time of extreme poverty in Orwell's own life. I would not call his portrait of those times "Orwellian", as its publisher, Harvest, does. Rather, as an avid reader and thrice-read student of "1984" ("'Oranges and lemons,' say the bells of St. Clemens…"), I was pleasantly surprised by the comme ci, comme ca position of the book's narrator, which comes through both in its obvious resentment of poverty's conditions and in its powerfully retained joy for living. It is this very mixture that allows the novel to read as if Orwell has laid his head on the pillow next to yours and is telling you, just you, this (unfortunately) timeless story. A mellow, marvelous piece of writing.

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Jeane, January 26, 2008 (view all comments by Jeane)
This is a detailed account of living in poverty in Paris and London. The narrator, an impoverished writer, describes his experiences living in Paris as a dishwasher for a posh French restaurant, and wandering the streets of London usually homeless, searching for lodging and food, consorting with pawnshops, sleeping in charity shelters, rubbing shoulders with bag ladies and tramps. His descriptions of what goes on in the bowels of the French hotel where the restaurant food is prepared are nauseating. The attitudes of British law towards vagrants was appalling. Mostly the book described pure misery and frustration trying to live without stable income and thus, a proper roof over one's head. In spite of how depressing it is, this remains one of my favorites of Orwell's books. It's a very engaging read.

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Product Details

ISBN:

9780156262248

Author:

Orwell, George

Publisher:

Mariner Books

Location:

San Diego :

Subject:

General

Subject:

Literary

Subject:

Fiction

Subject:

British and irish fiction (fictional works by

Subject:

British and irish

Subject:

Tramps

Subject:

England

Subject:

Tramps -- England -- London.

Subject:

Tramps - France - Paris

Subject:

Literature-A to Z

Copyright:

1972

Edition Description:

Trade Paper

Publication Date:

19720331

Binding:

TRADE PAPER

Language:

English

Illustrations:

Y

Pages:

228

Dimensions:

8 x 5.31 in 0.47 lb