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A review by octavia_cade
The Road to Wigan Pier by George Orwell
challenging
informative
sad
medium-paced
4.0
The introduction to this edition opens by calling the book "broken-backed," and it's not wrong. The first half is fascinating and worth five stars, being a series of chapters on the nature of poverty in the North of England, particularly in the mining and industrial regions. Orwell immersed himself in that life for a short period, experiencing what he reported on, and the details of how the working class lived, the sheer grinding degradation of their housing and so forth, are horribly vivid. It's immediate and affecting, an entirely sympathetic approach to communicating inequality and the costs of unrestrained capitalism. Then comes the second part, a rather more woolly- if still mildly entertaining - rant on the necessity of socialism and, not gonna lie, it kind of felt as if it went on forever.
Apparently the original editor wanted to publish the first half but not the second; he did not get his wish. That's kind of a shame. I can understand why Orwell wanted the two halves together: the first is there as motivation for the second, but he's kind of missed his own argument. Part of his explanation as to why socialism isn't more accepted by the general public, at time of writing, is that some of its adherents were far more focused on theory instead of practical fairness... and yet the very effectiveness of Wigan Pier's first half is absolutely undercut by this far less interesting pontification in the second half. It would have been more compelling if left to stand alone, I think.
Apparently the original editor wanted to publish the first half but not the second; he did not get his wish. That's kind of a shame. I can understand why Orwell wanted the two halves together: the first is there as motivation for the second, but he's kind of missed his own argument. Part of his explanation as to why socialism isn't more accepted by the general public, at time of writing, is that some of its adherents were far more focused on theory instead of practical fairness... and yet the very effectiveness of Wigan Pier's first half is absolutely undercut by this far less interesting pontification in the second half. It would have been more compelling if left to stand alone, I think.