A Child of the Jago

A Child of the Jago, published in 1896, is Arthur Morrison's unflinching novel of life in the Old Nichol, one of East London's worst slums. Dicky Dorvington is born into a world where crime is the only economy and respectability is a luxury no one can afford. Morrison, who knew the real Old Nichol intimately, wrote the novel as a deliberate counterpoint to the sentimental slum fiction of his day. The result is a work of fierce social realism that shocked Victorian readers and influenced generations of writers about urban poverty — raw, compassionate, and refusing to look away.