labour of love - Rated 
An extraordinary volume looking at a period (1780-1832) when the manufacturing classes got organised and gradually reduced wages and rationalised production, with the aid of a good deal of machinery. Thompson shows how the increasingly impoverished and alienated working classes, as they gradually came to think of themselves, worked their way through a variety of radical postures, including Jacobinism, dissent and methodism, constitutional reform, and then repressed by the Tory government during the Napoleonic wars went underground and turned up in 1816 more radical and numerous than ever. By this time we have highly organised if localised trade unions, groups and clubs in every neighbourhood studying Cobbett, The Black Dwarf and other radical literature, embracing agitation for universal suffrage and the cooperative ideas of Robert Owen. We also get fascinating pictures of men like Cobbett, Henry Hunt, William Blake and Hazlitt as well as many less well known names and the countless thousands who suffered and struggled in the interests of their class. Thompson also shows how historians who have not done his colossal research have often settled for Whig propaganda about the mindless character of the working class, or the condescension of contemporary historians like Place who wanted to play down the energy and commitment of radical elements. Above all Thompson for the most part works hard to get a balanced view sometimes from limited information and keeps his tongue in his cheek much of the time. He is witty and cheerful, and the book is full of quotations from original sources. A great read if you want to really understand what was going on when Britain became 'great'.
Social History is fascinating!! - Rated
I had two major preconceptions which this book has reduced to rubble. The first was that social history was boring; the second was that all working class movements were (disappointingly) lead or supported by the middle-classes, and once the middle-classes got what they wanted and put the brakes on the movements they led the workers collapsed. This led me to view the working class (from which I spring) as pliant, disordered and whimsical. However, this book has taught me: social history is not boring; and the working classes are not feckless, whimsical and slavish (at least not a majority at that time). This is the story of a whole way of life for the lower swathe of society being slowly and calculatedly ripped limb from limb then stitched back together by and for people who found it profitable for themselves to do so. However, the process was not acted on passive beings; hearteningly, the people upon whom some of the cruellest (sustained and systematic) acts in history (before the 20th Century) were perpetrated on fought back, and did a good deal to frustrate the aims of Authority. There was heroic resistance and a great deal of this resistance was led by the working classes themselves. The resisitance, by its nature, also developed political consciousnes, political involvement, and an admirable way of life that seems to have left this country now - returning home from work (12 - 14 hours in those days) and educating yourself. The story is well told, although admittedly it starts slowly and for those who have no interest in statistics they will find a few dull patches. Nevertheless, it is a vital, fascinating and inspiring work. We seldom hear of this period of history in ways other than 'the Nasty Bonaparte' and 'Hero Wellington'. It is envigorating to know that in Britain Wellington wasn't everybody's hero, that people thought for themsleves and were prepared to do something about their situation, nor was the war being fought viewed as a clean-cut good v evil duel adrumbating the wars of the Twentieth Century. Anecdotes, tales of sacrifice, notes on literary figures, cruelties of a ruthless ruling class, spies, dissemblers, controversies and daring conspiracies: there are other histories to be told; this book tells one of them and tells it very well.
Making of the English Working Class - Rated
Today Thompson's Marxist views are somewhat out of fashion, but this study is trully masterfull. You may hate his opinion and question his selection of sources, yet to ignore this work of would be a absolute shame on history. His views on Methodism (which cause the biggest stur at the time) should be looked at and considered. I probably should enter this review as it is my ancestors whom Thompson praises, nevertheless any stuident of social economic history should give this ago. Anyway to add balance you can always compare it Perkins "Origins of Modern English Society"
To quote the text "The Levolution has begun, so i'll and get my gun and shoot the Duke of Wellington" REMEMBER PETERLOO!
Pre-Marx, pre-Industrialism, pre-everything - Rated 
Thompson goes far back into British history to chart the emergence of the working classes, and indeed the middle and upper classes, before the great upheavals of the 19th century. A book that gives the history of the developments which led to industrialism and socialist thought.
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