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A searing account of life in the underclass and why it persists as it does, written by a British psychiatrist.
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Life at the Bottom

The Worldview That Makes the Underclass

RRP$34.99

$31.50

  • Paperback

    284 pages

  • Release Date

    8 March 2003

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Summary

This work is an account of life in the underclass and why it persists as it does, written by a British psychiatrist who treats the poor in a slum hospital and a prison in England. Its insight is that long-term poverty is caused not by economics but by a dysfunctional set of values, one that is continually reinforced by an elite culture searching for victims. It draws upon eye-opening, true-life vignettes that are by turns hilariously funny, chillingly horrifying, and all too revealing - sometimes all at once.

Book Details

ISBN-13:9781566635059
ISBN-10:1566635055
Author:Theodore Dalrymple
Publisher:Ivan R Dee, Inc
Imprint:Ivan R Dee, Inc
Format:Paperback
Number of Pages:284
Release Date:8 March 2003
Weight:372g
Dimensions:19mm x 148mm x 226mm
A-Format
B-Format
Life at the Bottom by Theodore Dalrymple - ISBN: 9781566635059
148 × 226 mm
C-Format
A4
mm / in
What They're Saying

Critics Review

Mr. Daniels “s best essays cast a spell almost from the opening line.

Truthful—therefore morally courageous and intellectually rigorous. – Norman Podhoretz
Dalrymple’s vivid writing and often heartbreaking stories rise above his deeply felt social analysis. * Publishers Weekly *
Brilliant social analysis…a master chronicle of life at the bottom. – Hilton Kramer
Lucid, unsentimental, and profoundly honest…Dalrymple is one of the great essayists of our age. – Denis Dutton, Editor, Arts & Letters Daily
This devastating account and analysis of underclass life—and the elite ideas which support it—is a classic for our times. – Thomas Sowell, Rose and Milton Friedman Senior Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University
It is a truism that ideas have consequences, but a truism is rarely illustrated as implacably as in this book. – George F. Will, syndicated columnist for The Washington Post
Theodore Dalrymple is the best doctor-writer since William Carlos Williams. – Peggy Noonan
Mr. Daniels’s best essays cast a spell almost from the opening line. * New York Sun *
A landmark experience is reading Life at the Bottom… * Detroit Free Press *
Once in a long while a writer comes along with a vision so powerful that it shakes you. Theodore Dalrymple is that kind of writer. – Bruce Ramsey * Liberty Press *

About The Author

Theodore Dalrymple

Theodore Dalrymple is a physician and psychiatrist who practices in England. He writes a column for the London Spectator, contributes frequently to the Daily Telegraph, and is a contributing editor of the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal. His other books include Our Culture, What’s Left of It, Mass Listeria, and So Little Done. He lives in Birmingham, England.

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