{"product_id":"vagabonds-9780715654958","title":"Vagabonds","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDickensian London is brought to real and vivid life in this Wolfson History Prize-shortlisted portrait by a rising-star historian and New Generation Thinker.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e‘Rich in research… a telling account’ \u003cstrong\u003eMartin Chilton, \u003cem\u003eIndependent\u003c\/em\u003e (Books of the Month)\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Compellingly written, utterly captivating... Jensen’s book is stuffed to bursting with original voices and sources alongside his well-crafted expert analysis… every page of \u003cem\u003eVagabonds\u003c\/em\u003e rings with the thrum and bass of a city that saw itself as the centre of the world' \u003cstrong\u003eFern Riddell, BBC History magazine\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e'\u003cem\u003eVagabonds\u003c\/em\u003e is a collection of exquisite stories. Open the cover and a beguiling crowd of characters run amok... Jensen gives these past lives a monument, a dignity and recognition they deserve. Jensen is the real deal; I’ve never encountered a historian quite like him’ \u003cstrong\u003eGerard de Groot, \u003cem\u003eThe Times\u003c\/em\u003e (Book of the Year)\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Jensen’s fascinating, delightfully readable book is animated by a formidable passion for recovering the stories of some of metropolitan London’s poorest, most precarious, but also most creative people, a passion that is all too rare in accounts of the period... \u003cem\u003eVagabonds\u003c\/em\u003e narrates their lives with a sympathy and sensitivity that is often moving' \u003cstrong\u003eMatthew Beaumont, author of \u003cem\u003eNightwalking: A Nocturnal History of London\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e'A very readable and historically well researched picture of the nineteenth-century poor' \u003cstrong\u003eGareth Stedman Jones, Professor of the History of Ideas, Queen Mary University of London, and author of \u003cem\u003eOutcast London\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Not only a notable accumulation, from original sources, of the horrors of survival on the streets of nineteenth-century London, but a devastating exposure of pseudo-charity as a form of coercive policing. A vigorous and necessary account made timely by the widening chasm between obscene wealth and dire poverty in our contemporary metropolis' \u003cstrong\u003eIain Sinclair, author of \u003cem\u003eThe Last London\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Oskar Jensen's \u003cem\u003eVagabonds\u003c\/em\u003e is an elegantly-written and vivid account of the people that lived and worked in Georgian and Victorian London. Jensen doesn't just present these hitherto marginalised figures on the page; like a delightful sorcerer, he brings them back to life' \u003cstrong\u003eTomiwa Owolade, award-winning author of \u003cem\u003eThis is Not America\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e‘Oskar Jensen has coaxed out of the archives a vast range of original voices of the street poor of London. With great sensitivity and scholarly rigour, he ensures that, once again, we hear the lived experiences of those who lived and died on the margins of metropolitan life’ \u003cstrong\u003eSarah Wise, author of \u003cem\u003eThe Blackest Streets\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eInconvenient People\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e'Superb... Writing with an elegance and emotional intelligence that exceeds many novels, he presents us with the lives of beggars (children and adults), match sellers, buskers, milkmaids, pickpockets, prostitutes and the odd famous actor... We are left with the sense that despite poverty, monotony and grinding hard work, these people’s human spirit, optimism and humour helped them triumph over their surroundings... This book provides an invaluable source to anyone setting their fiction in this world, which is also an immensely entertaining and informative read in its own right. One of the best history books I have read recently' \u003cem\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe Historical Novel Society\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Duckworth Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49404106473815,"sku":"9780715654958","price":10.44,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780715654958.jpg?v=1730485439","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/vagabonds-9780715654958","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}