Down and Out in Paris and London
Published in 1933, Down and Out in Paris and London is George Orwell's account of two stretches of voluntary and involuntary destitution. In Paris he washes dishes in the basement of a luxury hotel, working brutal hours for low wages and watching the cooks above him perform for the dining room. In London he drifts through doss houses and tramping circuits, sleeping in shared beds and lining up for thin tea and bread. Orwell uses the experience to argue that the lives of the poor are shaped less by character than by the structures around them. The book reads as both reportage and apprenticeship, the place where his plain prose and political eye first come together.
Also by George Orwell
What you might want to know about Down and Out in Paris and London
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
Orwell's first book recounts his years scraping by as a plongeur in Paris kitchens and a tramp on the roads of southern England.
Bourdain wrote a foreword to a reissue of the book and often called it the direct template for Kitchen Confidential, citing Orwell's view of restaurant kitchens from the dishwasher's station as the model for his own.
It is a memoir drawn from Orwell's real time as a plongeur in Paris and as a tramp in England, with some names and details changed.
Down and Out in Paris and London was written by George Orwell, published in 1933 by Harcourt Brace.
Down and Out in Paris and London is 213 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Down and Out in Paris and London takes most readers 3 to 5 hours to finish.
Down and Out in Paris and London is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.
