Wednesday 15 December 2010

Ragged Trousered Philanthropists day

The free market does not exist. In every nation, the corporations hold out their begging bowls and tax-payers line up to fill them. We are the ragged-trousered philanthropists of the 21st century, the comparatively poor obliged to sponsor the rich.
George Monbiot

Speaking of the Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, the TUC have organised a special day in their honour on Saturday 5 February 2011 with an event in Hastings:

A lively, radical day of music and speeches to commemorate the centenary of the death of author Robert Tressell.

Robert Noonan was born in Dublin in 1870 and died in Liverpool on 3 February 1911.

Whilst living in Hastings, he finished 'The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists' - the original title page of the book carried the subtitle 'Being the story of twelve months in Hell, told by one of the damned, and written down by Robert Tressell' - the Hell was the town of Mugsborough (Hastings, where he was living) and the book describes the horror and deprivation suffered by the working class as exampled by the building workers of that town.

Sponsored by SERTUC, GMB Southern Region, Writers Guild of Britain and Unite London and Eastern Region.

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