The Making of the English Working Class

The revolutionary account of working-class culture and ideals, reissued as a Penguin Modern Classic to mark the 50th anniversary of its publication

This brilliant account of working-class society in its formative years, 1780 to 1832, revolutionized our understanding of English social history. E. P. Thompson shows how the working class took part in its own making and re-creates the whole-life experience of people who suffered loss of status and freedom, who underwent degradation, and who yet created a cultured and political consciousness of great vitality.