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A chi è rivolto
Readers drawn to eyewitness reporting, social history, and writers who enter the scene will love this book. It also suits those fascinated by Edwardian London or Jack London's early work.
Che cos’è questo libro
What does it take to know how the poor of a great city really live? In the summer of 1902, the American writer Jack London decides the only way is to join them. He puts on secondhand rags, sews a gold coin into his shirt, and enters London's East End.
The People of the Abyss, published in 1903, is the record of that summer. London sleeps in workhouse wards and on park benches, stands in bread lines, picks hops in Kent, and talks with sailors, dockers, mothers and children. He writes as a reporter and a socialist, and he wants you to feel what he felt, then to ask who is responsible.
In questo riassunto
- 1Jack London buys rags and enters the East EndFree
- 2Poverty presses the respectable ever further east
- 3The Abyss grinds down workers and their children
- 4Frying-Pan Alley shows a sweatshop and a festering garden
- 5The casual ward gives a bed only to the lucky
- 6A night walking and a morning at the Salvation Army
- 7Coronation Day and hop fields expose two Englands
- 8Dan Cullen, the wage table and the ghetto
- 9Inefficiency and chance feed the slaughterhouse below
- 10Drink, thrift and failed helpers lead to mismanagement
Punto chiave 1 di 10
Jack London buys rags and enters the East End
In the summer of 1902, Jack London decides to see London's poor from the inside. He wants no police guide and no borrowed opinions. His friends tell him again and again that it cannot be done. He goes anyway.
At a secondhand shop he buys worn trousers, a frayed jacket, heavy shoes and a dirty cap. He sews a gold sovereign into his undershirt as an emergency fund. On the street the change is instant. Men who once called him sir now call him mate. A policeman asks whether he will walk or ride, and the value of his life seems to fall with the quality of his coat.
His fear of the crowd goes away, because he is now part of it. He talks with workmen as one man to another, with no one hoping to gain from him. To understand how the poor live, you must put on their clothes and join them.
That’s 1 of 10 key points.
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About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 58,800 words
- Reading timeAbout 4 h 5 min
- FormatseBook, large-print eBook, audiobook, 15-minute summary
- LanguagesEnglish and 13 other languages
Questions about Il popolo dell'abisso
What is The People of the Abyss about?
It is Jack London's account of living among London's poor in the summer of 1902. Dressed in rags, he sleeps in workhouses and on benches, picks hops, and records how wages, rents and chance push people downward.
Is The People of the Abyss a true story?
Yes, it is nonfiction. London lived in the East End in 1902 and published the book in 1903. He mixes his own scenes and conversations with statistics, police reports and quotations from other writers.
What does the Abyss mean in the title?
The Abyss is London's name for the bottom of society, where people without work, health or shelter end up. He pictures it as a pit or slaughterhouse that society itself keeps filling.
Is The People of the Abyss easy to follow?
Yes in the sense that matters. The chapters are short, each built around a scene or a person, and London writes in a direct, energetic voice. Tables and figures support the stories rather than replace them.
What is the main message of the book?
London argues that poverty in London is caused by a system that creates more workers than jobs and wastes its wealth. He calls this mismanagement and says society could feed and house everyone.
Cite this edition
London, Jack. The People of the Abyss. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-people-of-the-abyss.
London, J. (2026). The people of the abyss. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-people-of-the-abyss (Original work published 1903)
London, Jack. The People of the Abyss. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-people-of-the-abyss.
@book{london2026people,
author = {London, Jack},
title = {The People of the Abyss},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-people-of-the-abyss},
note = {First published 1903}
}
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