成人快手

Diana Quick reads the autobiography of Lucy Malleson, a detective writer of the 1930s and 40s who wrote under the name Anthony Gilbert.

First published in 1940, it鈥檚 a book which is valuable now for its sharp social history of working life in the early decades of the 20th century, and particularly for its focus on what it was like for women at work in offices.

It鈥檚 1930, unemployment is rising and making a living is precarious. In the East End of London, people are forced to work on what we would now call zero-hours contracts.

鈥淒ressmaking, trouser-finishing, millinery, cracker-factory work, above all, casual dock labour 鈥� all these are seasonal jobs. In bad times 鈥� and 1930 was the beginning of the slump 鈥� it was common to find machinists and dressmaking hands who only had an average of two days鈥� work a week. Beyond Stepney lie the Docks, and no man鈥檚 living is more precarious than that of the casual dock labourer. It鈥檚 desperately hard to get work and when you have got it you must work like a dog without even knowing whether you will be wanted tomorrow.

鈥淵ou may get one or even two days鈥� employment in the week, and on the other days you must go down to the Labour Exchange and 'sign on' in order to draw your unemployment pay at the week鈥檚 end. But the men who can accept this with equanimity are few. For the most part they will be driven to desperate straits before they apply for Poor Law Assistance. Elderly women are sometimes practically carried to the Relief Office by the parish doctor, because what they are really suffering from is not indigestion or giddiness, but sheer starvation.鈥�

Working as a kind of social worker, Lucy Malleson begins to visit pensioners in the East End of London. Her sharp and compassionate account of these visits creates an unforgettable picture of working-class London life in the 1930s, vividly brought to life by Diana Quick.

Reader: Diana Quick
Producer: Elizabeth Burke

A Loftus Media production for 成人快手 Radio 4