A novel that has social, and economic implications.....
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First edition
| |
| Author | Robert Tressell a.k.a. Noonan, born Croker |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Grant Richards |
Publication date
| 23 April 1914 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
Contents
[hide]Background[edit]
Robert Tressell was the nom-de-plume of Robert Noonan, a house painter. Although born in Dublin (and baptised with the surname Croker), Noonan settled in England after living in South Africa at the beginning of the twentieth century. He chose the pen name Tressell in reference to the trestle table, an important part of his kit as a painter and decorator. Based on his own experiences of poverty, exploitation, and his terror that he and his daughter Kathleen — whom he was raising alone — would be consigned to the workhouse if he became ill, Noonan embarked on a detailed and scathing analysis of the relationship between working-class people and their employers. The "philanthropists" of the title are the workers who, in Noonan's view, acquiesce in their own exploitation in the interests of their bosses.The novel is set in the fictional town of Mugsborough, based on the southern English coastal town of Hastings, where Noonan lived, although its geographical location is described in the book and is well away from the actual town of Hastings. The original title page of the book carried the subtitle: "Being the story of twelve months in Hell, told by one of the damned, and written down by Robert Tressell."
He completed The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists in 1910, but the 1,600-page hand-written manuscript was rejected by the three publishing houses to which it was submitted. The rejections severely depressed Noonan, and Kathleen had to save the manuscript from being burnt. She placed it for safekeeping in a metal box underneath her bed.
After Noonan died of tuberculosis, Kathleen was determined to have her father's writing published and showed it to a friend, the writer Jessie Pope. Pope recommended the book to her own publisher, who bought the rights in April 1914 for £25. It was published that year in much abridged form in the United Kingdom and in an even more abridged form (90,000 words, from the original 250,000), in 1918.[1] It was also published in Canada and the United States in 1914, in the Soviet Union in 1920, and in Germany in 1925. The publisher removed much of the socialist ideology from the first edition; an unabridged edition with Noonan's original ending was not published until 1955, edited by F.C.Ball, who also wrote two biographies of Tressell, Tressell of Mugsborough (1951), and One of the Damned:The Life and Times of Robert Tressell (1973).
Plot introduction[edit]
Clearly frustrated at the refusal of his contemporaries to recognise the inequity and iniquity of society, Tressell's cast of hypocritical Christians, exploitative capitalists and corrupt councillors provide a backdrop for his main target — the workers who think that a better life is "not for the likes of them". Hence the title of the book; Tressell paints the workers as "philanthropists" who throw themselves into back-breaking work for poverty wages in order to generate profit for their masters.The hero of the book, Frank Owen, is a socialist who believes that the capitalist system is the real source of the poverty he sees all around him. In vain he tries to convince his fellow workers of his world view, but finds that their education has trained them to distrust their own thoughts and to rely on those of their "betters". Much of the book consists of conversations between Owen and the others, or more often of lectures by Owen in the face of their jeering; this was presumably based on Tressell's own experiences.
Major themes[edit]
The book provides a comprehensive picture of social, political, economic and cultural life in Britain at a time when socialism was beginning to gain ground. It was around that time that the Labour Party was founded and began to win seats in the House of Commons.The book advocates a socialist society in which work is performed to satisfy the needs of all rather than to generate profit for a few. A key chapter is "The Great Money Trick", in which Owen organises a mock-up of capitalism with his workmates, using slices of bread as raw materials and knives as machinery. Owen 'employs' his workmates cutting up the bread to illustrate that the employer — who does not work — generates personal wealth whilst the workers effectively remain no better off than when they began, endlessly swapping coins back and forth for food and wages. This is Tressell's practical way of illustrating the Marxist theory of surplus value, which in the capitalist system is generated by labour.
The house that is under renovation in the book, referred to frequently as the 'job', is known by the workmen as 'The Cave'. Given the author's interest in the philosophy of Plato, it is highly likely that this is a reference to Plato's "Allegory of the Cave". A major recurring theme in Tressell's book highlights the inability and reluctance of the workers to comprehend, or even consider, an alternative economic system [other than free market capitalism]. The author attributes this inability, amongst other things, to the fact that they have never experienced an alternative system, and have been raised as children to unquestioningly accept the status quo, regardless of it being potentially inimical to their own interests. In Plato's work, the underlying narrative suggests that in the absence of an alternative, human beings will accept and submit to their present condition and consider it to be 'normal', no matter how contrived the circumstances.
Criticism[edit]
Writing in the Manchester Evening News in April 1946 George Orwell praised the book's ability to convey without sensationalism "the actual detail of manual work and the tiny things almost unimaginable to any comfortably situated person which make life a misery when one's income drops below a certain level." He considered it "a book that everyone should read" and a piece of social history that left one "with the feeling that a considerable novelist was lost in this young working-man whom society could not bother to keep alive."[2]Jonah Raskin has described The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists as "a classic of modern British literature, that ought to rank with the work of Thomas Hardy, D. H. Lawrence, and James Joyce, and yet is largely unknown...Tressel's bitterness and anger are mixed with compassion, sympathy and a sharp sense of humour." [3]
Adaptations[edit]
- A television adaptation in the Theatre 625 series was transmitted on BBC2 on 29 May 1967, starring Edward Fox as Barrington and Alan Wade as Bert the barrow boy, who feature on the front cover of the contemporary paperback. This adaptation no longer exists.
- A stage adaptation, written by Stephen Lowe and directed by William Gaskill, was first performed by Joint Stock Theatre Company in Plymouth on 14 September 1978. It opened at the Riverside Studios, Hammersmith on 12 October 1978. A two-handed version by Neil Gore debuted at the Hertford Theatre in July 2011 and has since toured including to the 2012 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
- A stage adaptation, written by Archie Hind and directed by David Hayman, was performed in 1984 by the Scottish agitprop theatre company 7:84.
- A stage adaptation, by Tom Mclennan, was commissioned by the union, PCS, for "Unions 08". The play is still running and on its third consecutive year of touring. The Tressell society said of the adaptation: "This is the best production of this important work we have ever seen."
- A 6 x 60-minute radio adaptation was transmitted as a "Classic Serial" on BBC Radio 4 in 1989. It starred Sean Barrett, Brian Glover and Peter Vaughan. It was produced by Michael Bakewell and dramatised by Gregory Evans.
- An adaptation was made by Above The Title Productions for BBC radio in 2008, produced by Rebecca Pinfield and Johnny Vegas, and directed by Dirk Maggs. Three 60-minute episodes were broadcast as the Classic Serial on Radio 4. Actors included Andrew Lincoln (Owen), Johnny Vegas (Easton), Timothy Spall (Crass), Paul Whitehouse (Old Misery), John Prescott (Policeman), Bill Bailey (Rushton), Kevin Eldon (Slyme), and Tony Haygarth (Philpot). This adaptation was nominated for a Sony Radio Drama Award in 2009.[4]
- In May 2009, BBC Radio 4 broadcast a two-part sequel called Mugsborough 1917, which featured many of the cast from the previous year's production. The dramatisation was by Andrew Lynch and features the characters of Robert Tressell's novel The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists, picking up the story 10 years on.[5]
- A stage adaptation, written by Howard Brenton and directed by Christopher Morahan, opened at the Liverpool Everyman on 17 June 2010 and subsequently transferred to co-producer the Minerva Theatre in Chichester as of 15 July 2010.
- Merseyside Young Labour, using an adaptation by Tom Mclennan, performed it as a fundraiser in August 2013, setting ticket prices as 'Pay What You Can Afford', in keeping with the book's values.
- A no-budget film adaptation loosely based on the play-script by Stephen Lowe was put into production by a group of young filmmakers in Norfolk; directed and adapted by George Moore and was due for independent release in October 2013, with the final edit completed in April 2014 in time for a small cast and crew premiere at the Forum, Norwich. As of May 28, 2014 the film is available for viewing on YouTube from George Moore Films, alongside two trailers.
- A 75-minute documentary about Tressell, the manuscript and the books impact was produced by Shut Out The Light (directed by Daniel Draper and Christie Allanson) in 2014. Contributors included Dennis Skinner MP, Tom Watson MP, Len McCluskey, Ricky Tomlinson, Stephen Lowe and Neil Gore. The film was described by The Socialist Worker as "an elegant celebration of the centenary of the book’s first publication." (http://socialistworker.co.uk/art/38580/Still+Ragged+-+film+celebrates+100+years+of+a+working+class+classic)
See also[edit]
- Socialism
- A Very British Coup – the book can be seen being read by the former girlfriend of the British Prime Minister
References and notes[edit]
- Jump up ^ Oxford World's Classics edition, 2005, edited and with an introduction by Peter Miles
- Jump up ^ George Orwell, Smothered Under Journalism, pp.256-257
- Jump up ^ "A Great Socialist Novel",In These Times magazine, August 22-28, 1979. (p. 17)
- Jump up ^ "Sony Award winners and nominees 2009" RadioAwards.org (Retrieved: 7 September 2009)
- Jump up ^ "Classic Serial: Mugsborough 1917" BBC.co.uk (Retrieved: 7 September 2009)
External links[edit]
- link to Radio 4 drama producers Above The Title
- Read the e-text online in HTML format at Literature Junction
- The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists at Project Gutenberg
- The Robert Tressell Centre
- The Robert Tressell Collection at the Hastings Museum Website (includes photographs of Robert Tressell)
- TUC guide to the novel
- Audiobook of The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists at LibriVox.org
- Official website for the George Moore film adaptation
- (http://www.raggedtrousered.com/1.html link to The Association of the Ragged Trousered
- (http://www.facebook.com/philanthropistsfilm link to the official Facebook page of the film adaptation
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Contents
[hide]Early life[edit]
Noonan was born in Dublin, Ireland, the illegitimate son of Samuel Croker, a senior member of the Royal Irish Constabulary. He was baptised and raised a Roman Catholic.[1] His father, who wasn't Catholic, had his own family, but attempted to provide for Robert until his death in 1875.Noonan had, in the words of his daughter, Kathleen, "a very good education" and could speak a variety of languages. However, when he was sixteen, he showed signs of a radical political consciousness, and left his family, declaring he "would not live on the family income derived largely from absentee landlordism". It was around this time he changed his surname from Croker to his mother's maiden name.[2]
Adult life[edit]
South Africa[edit]
In 1888, Noonan moved to Cape Town, South Africa, where, despite not having an apprenticeship, he became a painter and decorator. When he married in 1891, he was recorded as Robert Phillipe Noonan, Decorator. The marriage was an unhappy one, with his wife having numerous affairs after the birth of their daughter, Kathleen. They divorced in 1895, and Noonan acquired all the property, including their house in an affluent suburb of Cape Town.Noonan and his daughter moved to Johannesburg, where he secured a well-paying job with a construction company. It was here that he learned the ways of the industry he would later write about in his novel, although Noonan's actual circumstances varied greatly from the proletarian characters of the book. After becoming Secretary of the Transvaal Federated Building Trades Council, he was able to afford to send his daughter to an exclusive convent school and also to employ a black manservant called Sixpence, of whom he was said to be "very fond".[citation needed]
In 1897, Noonan led a successful protest against the employment of black skilled labour. During 1898, he became a member of the Transvaal Executive Committee of the Centennial of 1798 Association, which commemorated the revolutionary nationalist United Irishmen.[citation needed]
As a '98 Association member, Noonan helped form the Irish Brigades, an anti-British force that fought alongside the Boers in the Second Boer War. At this point, accounts of his life differ. Some assert he took up arms and was interned by the British until the end of the war, when he returned to Britain. Others say he left South Africa just before hostilities began in October 1899.[citation needed]
England[edit]
In any event, around the turn of the century, Noonan ended up in Hastings, Sussex. Here, he found work as a sign writer, but at much lower wages and in far poorer conditions than he had experienced in South Africa. Kathleen was initially sent to boarding and convent schools, but eventually Noonan could no longer afford them and Kathleen then attended state schools instead.[3]Noonan had to take part-time jobs in addition to his full-time position. He seems not to have joined a trade union. For a while, his political beliefs appeared to have moved rightwards, like many leading socialists of the time, to a more social-chauvinistic and anti-German viewpoint.[citation needed]
In sharp contrast to the days when he aided and perhaps fought with the Boers against Britain's imperialism, he now was designing aircraft, which he hoped would be accepted by the War Office. In 1905, his designs were rejected, and he turned leftwards once again. Influenced by the Marxist-influenced ideas of designer and socialist William Morris, he joined the Social Democratic Federation in 1906. The next year, after a dispute with his employer, Noonan lost his job. Despite the demand for his skills, his health began to deteriorate and he eventually developed tuberculosis. Unemployed and unable to remain politically active, he started writing, something he hoped would earn enough money to keep him from the workhouse.[citation needed]
He wrote under the pen name Robert Tressell as he feared the socialist views expressed in the book would have him blacklisted. He chose the surname Tressell as a play on the trestle table, an important part of a painter and decorator's kit. (Until the full manuscript was published in 1955, all copies of the book cited the author as Robert "Tressall".) He completed The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, (originally called The Ragged Arsed Philanthropists) in 1910, but the 1,600-page hand-written manuscript was rejected by the three publishing houses. The rejections severely depressed him, and his daughter had to save the manuscript from being burnt. It was placed for safekeeping in a metal box underneath her bed.[citation needed]
Death[edit]
Unhappy with his life in Britain, he decided that he and Kathleen should emigrate to Canada; however, he only reached Liverpool when he was admitted to the Royal Liverpool Infirmary, where he died of 'phthisis pulmonalis' (i.e. pulmonary tuberculosis) on 3 February 1911, aged 40.Noonan was buried in a pauper's grave on 10 February 1911 at Liverpool Parochial Cemetery, later known as Walton Park Cemetery.[4] The location of the grave was not rediscovered until 1970. Twelve other people were buried in the same plot. The plot is now marked although the land is no longer used as a cemetery, it is now used by Rice Lane City Farm.[5] The site is opposite Walton prison. A nearby road is named Noonan Close.
Posthumous publication[edit]
Kathleen mentioned her father's novel to a friend of hers, writer Jessie Pope, who recommended it to her publisher. In April 1914, the publisher bought the rights to the book for £25, and it appeared in Britain, Canada and the United States later that year, in the Soviet Union in 1920, and in Germany in 1925. The version as originally published was heavily abridged by Pope, with much of the socialist ideology removed. Pope's version ended with the novel's hero, Frank Owen, who taught that "money was the cause of poverty", contemplating suicide.[citation needed]The original manuscript was subsequently located by F. C. Ball and, after he had raised funds to acquire and reassemble the original version, an unabridged edition was published in 1955.
The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists has been cited as a factor in the landslide Labour victory in 1945,[6] and even for the election of two non-Labour-endorsed Communist members of Parliament that same year. It has been taught in schools and universities, and adapted for stage, television and radio, and readings have been performed at trade union meetings.
Declan Kiberd has argued that Pádraic Ó Conaire's seminal novel in Irish, Deoraíocht, has many parallels in its progressive socialism with Tressell's The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists.[7]
Use of Tressell's name[edit]
Tressell's name has been used over the years by various groups and individuals, mainly in and around Hastings:- The Robert Tressell Workshop — a publishing concern based in Hastings.
- Robert Tressell Close — a small residential street in Hastings named after the writer.
- Tressell Ward — a political ward in Hastings.
- The Robert Tressell Lectures — a series of annual lectures concerning not only The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, but also other aspects of left-wing politics and sociology.
- Tressell Publications — a small politically based publishing house.
- Robert Tressell Halls of Residence — accommodation for students studying at University of Brighton, Hastings Campus.
- Noonan's Steps - name of a stepped passageway running alongside the author's former home at 115 Milward Road.
- Tressell Ward - a Medical ward in the Conquest Hospital, St. Leonard's-on-Sea
References and notes[edit]
- Jump up ^ Irish Genealogy ie
- Jump up ^ Harker, Dave: TUC History Online – Robert Tressell
- Jump up ^ Harker, Dave: TUC History Online – Robert Tressel
- Jump up ^ Ancestry
- Jump up ^ Find A Grave
- Jump up ^ Rose, David; "What MPs Read" LRB.co.uk (Letters, Vol.24 No.6), 21 March 2002 (Retrieved: 8 September 2009)
- Jump up ^ Declan Kiberd, Idir Dhá Chultúr (Baile Átha Cliath, 2002), p. 137
External links[edit]
- The Robert Tressell Society website
- Hastings Museum and Art Gallery: Robert Tressell
- Works by Robert Tressell at Project Gutenberg
- Works by or about Robert Tressell at Internet Archive
- Works by Robert Tressell at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)
- The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists – original manuscript UnionHistory.info
- The Hastings Chronicle report on Tressell
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Categories:
- 1870 births
- 1911 deaths
- Deaths from tuberculosis
- House painters
- Infectious disease deaths in England
- Irish novelists
- Irish socialists
- Painters and decorators
- People from Dublin (city)
- People from Hastings
- Social Democratic Federation members
- 20th-century Irish novelists
- Irish expatriates in South Africa
- Irish expatriates in England
