Down and Out in Paris and London

"Down and Out in Paris and London (1933) was the first book published by Eric Arthur Blair under the pseudonym George Orwell. The book offers an account of Blair's experiences of poverty -- of being 'down and out' -- as he tried to build a career as a writer. The book begins by describing the experience of destitution in Paris, and particularly work as a plongeur -- pot-washer -- in restaurant kitchens. The second section consists of comparable experiences in England: the low-paid work Orwell finds is as a hop-picker in Kent, and the squalid accommodation he describes are the 'kips' or 'doss-houses' of London. The question of the book's genre is open to debate -- though the raw material is broadly non-fictional, Orwell treats it with some of the techniques of the fiction writer, rearranging the historical order of events to produce a more compelling narrative, or to spare the blushes of his family. The book was published by Gollancz in the UK and Harper & Brothers in the US, and was generally well-received. English sales remained relatively low until it was picked up by Penguin in 1940 and categorised as 'Fiction'"--https://www.bl.uk/works/down-and-out-in-paris-and-london