Factory Lives: Four Nineteenth-Century Working-Class Autobiographies

by James R. Simmons Jr. (Editor), Janice Carlisle (Introduction), John Brown

Factory Lives contains four works of great importance in the field of nineteenth-century working-class autobiography: John Brown's A Memoir of Robert Blincoe; William Dodd's A Narrative of the Experience and Sufferings of William Dodd; Ellen Johnston's Autobiography; and James Myles's Chapters in the Life of a Dundee Factory Boy.

This Broadview edition also includes a remarkably rich selection of historical documents that provide context for these works. Appendices include contemporary responses to the autobiographies, debates on factory legislation, transcripts of testimony given before parliamentary committees on child labour, and excerpts from literary works on factory life by Harriet Martineau, Frances Trollope, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, among others.

496 pages, Paperback

First published April 10, 2007

About the author

James R. Simmons, Jr. is Associate Professor of English at Louisiana Tech University.

Reviews

[Elisabeth]

(I read two of the autobiographies for class)

[Sam]

Had to read it for school and it was interesting, but I wouldn't have read it just for fun.