Consistently setting itself against the cheerless evangelical strain in Victorian philanthropy, All Sorts and Conditions of Men offers a blueprint for the cultural regeneration of Britain's proletariat as Angela and Harry plan a 'Palace of Delight' to provide 'a little more of the pleasures and graces of life' for the East Enders they have come to know. Indeed, five years after the book's publication, Besant's 'generous and glowing imagination' was praised as the inspiration for the real-life 'The People's Palace' on the Mile End Road, and All Sorts and Conditions of Men became that rare thing, a work of fiction which made something happen. This book is intended for students of nineteenth-century English literature, history, and the reform movement; the general reader. —This text refers to an alternate edition. (Amazon)