Getting Graphic with The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists

Inside the sign- and lettering-packed graphic adaptation of 'The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists'.

Getting Graphic with The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists
Men at work in the graphic novel adaptation of The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists.

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists is a hugely influential book in British political life, and its impact has reached well beyond those shores. It documents the poverty of a group of painter-decorators working on a house in the fictional town of Mugsborough. Set in the early twentieth century, its author Robert Tressell drew extensively from personal experience as a struggling signwriter and decorator in the English seaside town of Hastings.

Times are tough in Mugsborough, with even skilled tradesmen struggling to make ends meet.