Jack London

The People of The Abyss Jack London

The age of Queen Victoria (1819-1901) was a time of rapid change and dramatic growth for London which was England's largest city. The First Industrial Revolution (1760-1840) in Europe was underway. While the advent of new machinery and inventions improved the lives of many Londoners, hundreds of thousands of the poor suffered.
Industrialization
Prior to the First Industrial Revolution (1760-1840), England had an economy primarily based on agricultural and handcrafted goods. People made their own goods or purchased them from local craftsmen who sold only locally or regionally. Travel was limited to walking or horseback, so people rarely ventured outside their community.
Lives began to change as machines were invented to create mass-produced goods. The products that people bought from local artisans could now be purchased from companies. Travel changed, too, as the London-Birmingham railroad was finalized and people could ride the train. People began moving from the countryside to the city.
Jack London chronicles these changes in The People of the Abyss and discusses their negative implications for the workers of England. People who arrived from the country looking for work "got a single room at a cruel rent ... and they fell into the hands of those who sweat the last drop out of man and woman and child." They "found that two rooms would cost ten shillings a week. Food was dear and bad, water was bad ... Work was hard to get, and its wage was so low that they were soon in debt." Life was difficult for people living in the East End, and London quickly noticed the disparity.