The Road to Wigan Pier

By: George Orwell

Narrated by: Frederick Davidson

Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins

Publisher's summary

When Orwell went to England in the 1930s to find out how industrial workers lived, he not only observed but shared in their experiences. He stayed in cramped, dreary lodgings and subsisted on the scant, cheerless diet of the poor. He went down into the coal mines and walked crouching, as the miners did, through a one- to three-mile passage too low to stand up in. He watched the back-breaking, dangerous labor of men whose net pay then averaged $575 a year. And he knew the unemployed, those who had been out of work for so long they had sunk beyond despair into an inhuman apathy.

In this searing yet beautiful account of life on the bottom rung, Orwell asks himself why Socialism - which alone, he felt, could rescue human values from the ravages of industrialism - had so little appeal. His answer is a harsh critique of the Socialism and Socialists of his time.

Public Domain (P)1993 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Very interesting book by a socialist in the 1930s!

This book is an interesting and detailed insight into the life of the working class in England in the 1930s, as well as into the thinking life of the intellectual socialists of that time. Mind you, most of the predictions Orwell made about the bleakness of the future of industrialization, and the inevitablility of socialism's adoption were way off-target, but then he didn't have the historical record of socialism's abject economic failures to draw upon as we do today, since it was almost all in the future at that time.

Nevertheless the way he analyzes from every angle, the thinking of socialists and non-socialists alike, is fascinating. What an intelligent man he was (I know, I know, if he was so intelligent, why did he get the future and the workability of socialism as an economic model so wrong? But I already addressed that in the last paragraph). Also, the details he describes in the everyday are a testimony to his incredible way with words.

The narrator's snobbish-sounding upper-class British dialect adds a lot to the reading, capturing the spirit of condescencion that Orwell clearly had for all sorts of groups he describes, whether socialists or non-socialists.

A first-class listen. I almost couldn't put it down.

Hard to believe that was so recent

Orwell starts by recounting the living conditions of, what Victor Davis Hanson has termed, the muscular class. Post-war England’s working poor (or not working) dealt with conditions that are hard to comprehend. Made me chuckle when I think of the American college student rebelling against the ‘slave wages’ of $12/hour. After listening to this you’ll look at your bathtub or shower and H&C faucets with a sort of lust and relief.

The end of the book is a recipe for winning the cultural/political battle against the rise of Fascism. Still apropos to this day.

Worth your time to be sure.

Oh, and pay attentions to the last few paragraphs of the first 6 chapters. He polished them to a mirror-like finish with a razor’s edge.

Still relevant

Enjoyed very much. Many of Orwell’s observations remain relevant today. Perhaps not the one about the working class smelling bad!

modestly interesting

repossessed by Jordan Peterson, the last few chapters about fascism, socialism, capitalism, etc, were the best. Neat insight into the common man's world at the time. typically I don't like this Blackstone narrator, but he didn't overly dramatized his accent in this treating, somehow.

The book is excellent the introduction sucks

I would highly recommend that you skip the introduction as it is written by a bore.
Unfortunately the into is part of the first chapter so you will have to manually fast forward about 26 minutes to start the actual book. Orwell is a master at his craft. Enjoy!

Best read in the full context of Orwell

A well written book with great insight on the living conditions of the early 20th century and the overall political movement of that time. A very Pro-Socialist, Anti-Facist message was given by Orwell in his earlier books like this one. Orwell was spot on about Fascism and what it would do to Europe, but it is an interesting look at his early views on Socialism, a political view he would later begin to reject. This is why I would highly suggest this read (or listen), but I would make sure to read his other books after this one to make sure you understand the full context and evolution of Orwell's views on politics and culture.

Two books in one

I bought this because Jordon Peterson mentioned it a few times in his lectures and I figured I would buy it. So what I got was something like two books.
The first half of the book is describing the terrible living conditions of people living in Wigan Pier in the North of England circa 1937. Orwell was staying in a lodging house in a room cramped in with several men. Yet the most disgusting thing he described in this house was the food. The man of the house would hand him bread with a dirty looking black thumb on the bread. He also described this same person carrying a chamber pot (where you poop and pee in) with that same thumb resting on the inside of the bowl.
The second half of the book is more a reflection on Socialist in Britain at the time. A critic of Socialists and what they are doing wrong and what's wrong about them. The forward is a critic of this critic. So the forward, by another person, attacks the second part of the book long before you get to it. Anyway, Socialists aren't the only people he seems to have a problem with, he'll include adult Catholic converts like Chesterton, and authors such as HG Wells and DH Lawrence. He also has a healthy dose of criticism for himself and his attitude towards class and his middle class identity that is very much a part of him.
The narrator is wonderful, however I could have sworn I heard some background voices in the recording. Overall the narration was great, because it was in a British accent.

Narrator was perfect.

This narrator was perfect for this role. He captured Orwell’s smugness perfectly. Good book with interesting perspective.

Indispensable Orwell — both parts are fascinating

The first part of this book, recounting Orwell’s experiences among the working class in the Midlands, is really quite riveting, especially the first chapter, which details his days boarding above a tripe shop, an establishment so horrendously filthy that Orwell’s disgusted description of it is (deliberately) hilarious. It’s a marvelous piece of journalism.

The second part of the book comprises his observations on the English class system and on his fellow English socialists, whom he skewers, at times, quite amusingly. His reminiscences about the role of class in his own background was fascinating to me; I hadn’t realized quite how much the middle and upper classes regarded the working class in Orwell’s day as virtually a different species.

I’ve mentioned elsewhere how unlucky Orwell was in having a reader like Frederick Davidson, so I’ll repeat what I said: I can’t keep track of whether “Richard Brown,” “Joseph Porter,” and “Frederick Davidson” are one and the same person or a couple of different readers who sound the same, but — assuming it’s one person — he’s the very worst reader Orwell could have had (and Davidson is credited with a number of the books): He sounds like a parody of a snobbish, effeminate head waiter and has exactly the sort of exaggeratedly effete accent that Orwell himself detested. To compound his faults, he reads every sentence the same, without understanding, going UP after each clause, again and again, then DOWN at the end. What a shame Orwell has gotten stuck with him.

Nice sketches of people and places.

What did you love best about The Road to Wigan Pier?

Orwell paints vivid portraits of people and place. Got claustrophobic listening to him write about visiting a mine.

What was one of the most memorable moments of The Road to Wigan Pier?

The aforementioned visit to the mine.

What does Frederick Davidson bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

I thought he did a serviceable job.

Any additional comments?

The problem I had with the book is half of it, it seems, is devoted to Orwell's thoughts on government. Frankly, it wasn't interesting at all. This book needed more people, less ideas.