Books

1933. London: Victor Gollancz. 1933. 8vo. Original black publisher's cloth, backstrip lettered in yellow; lacking the exceptionally rare dust jacket; pp. [iv], 5-288; book with slight shelf lean; bumped and slightly warped at edges; a couple of small nicks and chips to spine, with a little loss of cloth; internally a rather clean example, some pencil markings now erased from the endpapers; contemporary ownership name and date in pencil to ffep; previous bookseller sticker partially removed from rear paste-down; a very good copy, still, of a book often found browned or foxed; a surprisingly clean example. First edition. In 1927, George Orwell [Eric Blair] resigned from his position as a policeman in Burma and returned to London, where he took rooms in Portabello. During his time in the city, he undertook a number of 'tramping' expeditions, intentionally sleeping rough and collecting material for an article which was later published in his essay The Spike in 1931. In 1928 Orwell…

George Orwell’s 'Down and Out in Paris and London' is a gritty memoir splitting its narrative between the two cities named, exploring the underbelly of society and the life of the author's own experiences living in poverty. The book dives into themes of class, society, and the struggle for survival in an indifferent world.