The People of the Abyss

The People of the Abyss is a book about life in the East End of London. Jack London wrote this first-hand account by living in the East End for several months, sometimes staying in workhouses or sleeping on the streets. The conditions he experienced and wrote about were the same as those endured by an estimated 500,000 of the contemporary London poor. Jack London was an American author, journalist, and social activist, a pioneer in the world of commercial magazine fiction and was one of the first fiction writers to obtain worldwide celebrity and a large fortune from his fiction alone. He is best remembered as the author of Call of the Wild and White Fang, both set in the Klondike Gold Rush. He also wrote of the South Pacific in such stories as The Pearls of Parlay and The Heathen, and of the San Francisco Bay area in The Sea Wolf.

The People of the Abyss is Jack London's riveting expose of the conditions in the East End of London at the dawn of the 20th century. Stranded in Britain's capital after a cancelled assignment, London poses as a down-on-his-luck sailor and takes up residence in the slums of the East End. Sleeping in shelters and working odd jobs, he discovers a people doomed to poverty and starvation by age and ill health rather than laziness. Complementing his own experiences with extensive research, London delivers a scathing critique of the economic system and a heartfelt plea for compassion. With its tremendous contemporary relevance, The People of the Abyss still has as much power to shock and move as it did over 100 years ago."