The Road to Wigan Pier

The Road to Wigan Pier ( engl. The Road to Wigan Pier, published in London in 1937 by Victor Gollancz Ltd. ) Is one of the most important works of George Orwell.

Content

The book consists of two very different parts. In the first part Orwell describes in a classic to be named social reportage experiences he made ​​in the northern English industrial area ( in the towns of Barnsley, Sheffield and Wigan) beginning in 1936. The small mining town of Wigan is located approximately between Liverpool and Manchester. In the thirties, many miners were unemployed there. The book describes in detail how their living conditions worsened since the First World War. Orwell gives at the end of the first part of his term view that socialism could improve the living conditions of the people.

In the second part, the author puts in essay form deals with the current political situation both in the Empire and in Europe. He complains that the protagonists of the socialist movement make this little honor. Orwell is mainly the question of why socialism in Britain has not more followers, especially in the population who would benefit economically from it. This is attributed by the author on five factors:

1 Inverse class prejudices: The one-sided glorification of the workers and their way of life to people belonging culturally rather the middle class feel repelled.

2 technocracy: Many socialists tend loud Orwell to technical progress for its own sake and to promote to have utopian ideas about the feasibility of social change.

3 jargon: The pompous phraseology socialist books and articles and the many technical terms (eg, relations of production, the main opposition etc. ) act on the reader dissuasive.

4 Lack of concentration on the essentials: the author, socialists would be too preoccupied with philosophical consistency and ideological orthodoxy, and would be their basic concern - improving the lives of people - often lose sight of.

5 " quirk " ( crankiness ): In the socialist movement can be found, as Orwell, not a few people with very unorthodox lifestyle ( he calls about vegetarians, nudists, people with beards and sandals, etc. ) This would discourage many conventional people of to join this movement.

Furthermore, it sets the pauperization of the middle class to the burgeoning in the UK fascism in relationship. The name of the book is not easy to interpret: a pier is a landing site for ships, a very typical structure for the English seaside resorts. Wigan lies inland and is rather the opposite of a holiday destination. The book presents Orwell noted that Wigan Pier was torn down and no one could tell him where he once stood. It would have probably been a coal loading facility on the canal bank.