Ten top books about working life

Joanna Biggs is a writer and editor at the London Review of Books. Her new book is All Day Long: A Portrait of Britain At Work.

One of her top ten books about working life, as shared at the Guardian:

Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

Hardy pays attention to the details of agricultural work as we follow Tess from Alec D’Urberville’s estate to the dairy farm where she falls in love with Angel Clare, the parson’s son, and the frozen fields she ends up working in when her past is revealed. Here’s Tess at work in the milking parlour: “There was for a time no talk in the barton, and not a sound interfered with the purr of the milk-jets into the numerous pails, except a momentary exclamation to one of the beasts requesting her to turn around or stand still.”

Read about another entry on the list.

Also see Aman Sethi's five best books on work and working.

--Marshal Zeringue