The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists (Wordsworth Classics)

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I designed to show the conditions resulting from poverty and unemployment: to expose the futility of the measures taken to deal with them and to indicate what I believe to be the only real remedy, namely - Socialism. I intended to explain what Socialists understand by the word "Poverty"; to define the Socialist theory of the causes of poverty, and to explain how Socialists propose to abolish poverty." Tressell's name has been used over the years by various groups and individuals, mainly in and around Hastings. Set in the still shabby seaside town of Hastings, and dealing with a bunch of painters and decorators trying to earn a living working for a penny-pinching firm, it reads like the bastard son of Hard Times. There are some great character names of the Bodgit and Scarper type, while most of the characters labour under a pernicious philosophy that keeps people down. The use of pieces of bread to demonstrate why the hero's co-workers are, and will remain, the eponymous ragged trousered philanthropists is alone worth the cover price of the book so you are really in for a bargain if you've borrowed this from your library instead.

Many people have praised the Authenticity of the novel. In his preface to the novel Robert Tressell says In writing this book my intention was to present, in the form of an interesting story, a faithful picture of working class life…The work possesses at least one merit – that of being true. I have invented nothing. There are no scenes or incidents in the story that I have not either witnessed myself or had conclusive evidence of. Tony Benn described it as a torch to be passed from generation to generation. A sentiment that’s been echoed by others like Tom Watson and Len McLusky. My dad enthused about its authenticity and recommended it to me, and I read it as a teenager; its injustices angered me and inspired me and it still does. It’s a remarkably powerful novel that I’m proud is in the TUC Library. Now,’ continued Owen, ‘I am a capitalist; or, rather, I represent the landlord and capitalist class. That is to say, all these raw materials belong to me. It does not matter for our present argument how I obtained possession of them, or whether I have any real right to them; the only thing that matters now is the admitted fact that all the raw materials which are necessary for the production of the necessaries of life are now the property of the Landlord and Capitalist class. I am that class: all these raw materials belong to me.’ Hastings and St Leonards was a formerly genteel town with no industry, a growing problem of poverty and unemployment. This to Robert was made worse by the election in 1906 of a Conservative MP in what had been a Liberal constituency. The decline in the standard of living for the working class that followed, some have argued, provided the catalyst for Robert to start writing what would become the RTP. What is this Socialism that we hear so much about, but which so few understand? What is it, and what does it mean?’It is very funny book, very sad book and very Union book. The sadness part of this book is that it was published in April 1914 to show paint trade was been treat and by end of year it didn't matter because WWI started and the paint was drying in the poppy fields in blood. 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. And the message ...that society's repeated failure to fairly distribute the necessities of human life, and a pathalogical tendency towards corruption and vain consumption are so prevalent, so manifestly routine, that our doom is all but certain. Our very survival as a species may lie in re-organizing our affairs efficiently for the benefit of all, rather than the priviledge of few. Owen was well aware that ‘People always take great care of their horses’, but effectively tell employees to ‘Submit or Starve, Eat dirt, or eat nothing', yet Owen blames the workers.

I still think there's no better explanation of the failings of capitalism than Owen's demonstration of the system using his colleagues' slices of bread, and the scene late in the story where Barrington encounters the workers' children outside the toyshop moves me to tears every time I read it. In about 1894, Noonan moved to Johannesburg, with Kathleen, who lived in a convent boarding school. In Johannesburg, Noonan worked for the painting and decorating firm of Herbert Evans and seems to have had a foreman's job. During the 1890s a number of attempts were made to organise amongst British and other immigrant workers. One of them was the Trades and Labour Council (TLC), also known as the Transvaal Federated Building Trade Council. In the late 1890s, the organisation represented 'only the building trades, called together by Mr Noonan of Mssrs Herbert Evans and co'. It was in Johannesburg that he was drawn into socialist politics. He was elected to the committee of the newly formed International Independent Labour Party. Elected alongside Noonan was James Thompson Bain and it is possible that through Bain, Noonan was introduced to the socialist ideas of Robert Blatchford, and the political writings of William Morris, both thinkers that influenced the writing found in The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists. That is fine, I have no objection to learning what Socialists feel about poverty or anything else, I have certainly learned it now. What bothered me is that every time our main character, Frank Owen opened his mouth it was to tell us once again about Socialism. Instead of getting me more and more interested as the book goes on it makes me want to cry out "no, not again"! I would feel the same way if each time I walk out of my house one of my Christian brothers or sisters started telling me about going to church. It also made me wonder if every time someone comes near me do I start telling them about Christmas. I'll have to pay attention to what I'm saying for awhile. Here are some of Owen's beliefs we get to hear over and over again: Robert Tressell, the author of the classic socialist novel, The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, was one of the most influential writers in twentieth-century England. Yet, for decades after his death, hardly anyone knew who he was. He died 3 February 1911 in Liverpool Royal Infirmary, and was buried a week later in a pauper’s grave. The book which he worked on for the final five years of his life had never been published — and, as far as he knew, it never would.

The political economy of hunger

I first came across this while reading the Secret Diary of Adrian Mole - a "sacred text" of mine when I was about 12. Adrian, wanting to be an intellectual, had got hold of the book but - I think - wasn´t sure he wanted to read a book about badly dressed stamp collectors. Now this book itself has become something of a sacred text to a lot of people and - finally getting around to reading it at 44 years young - I can see why. Perhaps that is the book's secret strength. It is not a picture of extreme hardship but it's working class characters are boxed in a trap from which there will only be one escape (or two if you include socialism so only one escape then - one involving a wooden box just to be clear).

Drawn heavily from, and perhaps because of, his own life experience; Tressle's fictional novel is about a group of 'working' men and their families, fighting for survival in a relentless and mortal struggle, to avoid poverty, and starvation. Dave is the author of Tressell: The real story of The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists (London: Zed Books, 2003. Manila: Ibon Books, 2004). His workmates in Johannesburg remembered Tressell as a ‘wild Irishman’. This is where we get the first sense of his involvement in politics — not in socialism, as such, but Irish republicanism. He is said to have regularly worn the green sash of the United Irishmen, and served on the committee of the Transvaal ’98 Centenary Association which marked the anniversary of their uprising. His membership card — signed ‘RP Noonan’ and bearing the slogan ‘Live Ireland, Perish Tyranny’ — survives in the archives of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) in London. Tressell’s Irish upbringing was the source of considerable confusion for Ball. He had lived two rather different lives, and even within those there were contradictions. Tressell was born the son of Samuel Croker (whose name he first used) and Mary Noonan at 37 Wexford Street in Dublin, where a plaque today hangs in his honour. Croker, an inspector with the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) and later a magistrate, was a man of considerable means. ‘What happened to my working-class writer?’, Ball wondered in his works. Robert Tressell’s plaque on Wexford Street, Dublin, where he was born. (Credit: The Tressell Memorial) This book is about the ugly side of capitalism and the hardships it causes working people, it is a book calling for socialism by pointing out the systemic failures of the capitalist system and how these will only be overcome once private ownership is abolished. There would have been quite a long period after the second world war when people might have smugly felt that that harsh face of capitalism had become a thing of the past and that now the abject poverty facing people as described in this book, where people were required to be able and willing to work all day and all week, and still live in poverty, had become unthinkable. But we have returned to a time when people can work (and even work in multiple jobs) while still not having the basic requirements of life: shelter, food, clothing.

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This is an ideological book, and it is a work of fiction. Part of me believes that fiction and ideology make bad bedfellows. Part of the reason for that is that fiction nearly always allows (and frequently implies) an ironic reading, and ideology doesn’t really expect that and so is undermined by not seeing the possible ironic reading. But this book is perhaps a little too didactic to allow an ironic reading. He became active in the Irish Nationalist circle in the Transvaal. In 1898 Noonan became a member of the executive committee of the Transvaal '98 Commemoration Committee – established to arrange a celebration of the centenary of the Irish uprising. One of those who helped plan the Johannesburg commemoration was an Irish immigrant called Arthur Griffith, and serving on the committee was an assayer of the mine, John MacBride. The Boer government saw militant Irish Nationalism as a potential ally against the British. Noonan left Johannesburg shortly before the Boer War erupted. Your question has really nothing to do with the subject we are discussing: we are only trying to find out why the majority of people have to go short of the benefits of civilization. One of the causes is--the majority of the population are engaged in work that does not produce those things; and most of what IS produced is appropriated and wasted by those who have no right to it." Yet when the foreman cuts the less skilled workers’ wages by from seven pence an hour to sixpence halfpenny downstairs, Owen carries on doing skilled work upstairs at eight pence an hour.

Robert gave the manuscript to Kathleen as a present saying “I can’t leave you money or property, but look after this, it might come in useful some day.” Soon after he left for Liverpool with the intention of finding work before getting a ship to Canada. Kathleen never saw him again. His biographer Fred Ball says it is doubtful he thought he would make it. He was in an advanced state of TB and was admitted to the work-house hospital where he died in February 1911.Robert Phillipe Noonan (17 April 1870 – 3 February 1911), born Robert Croker, and best known by the pen name Robert Tressell, was an Irish writer best known for his novel The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists. That is why The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists remains so important today and the voice of Frank Owen can still come across with such contemporary power to speak to those who have not yet realised that pessimism and despair make us collaborators in our own fate.