George Orwell

'It is only when you meet someone of a different culture from yourself that you begin to realize what your own beliefs really are.' The Road to Wigan Pier is George Orwell's 1937 study of poverty and working-class life in northern England. It is the book which established Orwell as among Britain's foremost political and social commentators. It is, moreover, essential for any reader who wishes to gain a deeper understanding of Orwell's life, work and legacy. This non-fiction work set the tone for Orwell's subsequent career, by focusing on class relations within Britain and political solutions to social problems. The Road to Wigan Pier has remained widely read since his death, running to several editions, and providing a point of comparison for later social and political commentaries

The Road to Wigan Pier

Daniel Bower

What we have lost in food we have gained in electricity… in cheap luxuries which mitigate the surface of life.

I would love to find a source for this gramophone claim. An early example of a "killer acquisition" as it gets called in economics parlance.

Given a mechanical civilization the process of invention and improvement will always continue, but the tendency of capitalism is to slow it down, because under capitalism any invention which does not promise fairly immediate profits is neglected; some, indeed, which threaten to reduce profits are suppressed almost as ruthlessly as the flexible glass mentioned by Petronius.

For example: Some years ago someone invented a gramophone needle that would last for decades. One of the big gramophone companies bought up the patent rights, and that was the last that was ever heard of it.

The Road to Wigan Pier quotes

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