Private Island
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Summary
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Private Island by James Meek
How the British government packaged and sold its people to the world.
James Meek's superb book exposes the perversities, hypocrisies and failures of privatisationMeek is a writer of fiction as well as a journalist, and it shows: he crafts beautiful and vivid passages that turn what could be a dry subject into a highly readable study. -- Owen Jones * New Statesman *
Do yourself a favour: read Private Island and find out what has really happened in Britain over the past 20 years. -- John Gray * Guardian *
[A] devastating account of the privatisation dogma of the past 25 years ... As demolition jobs go, this can hardly be bettered. -- John Kampfner * Observer *
If you have a taste for historical irony & absurdity, you'll love this book. -- Francis Wheen * Mail on Sunday *
An energetic and colourfully told polemic against privatisation. * Financial Times *
James Meek's brilliant book, bracing in its detail and sweeping in its scope, makes clear just how central privatisation is to the story of contemporary Britain: some of it will make you sad, some of it will make you furious, but you are guaranteed to be left feeling that you understand this country much better. * John Lanchester, author of Capital and Whoops! *
One of the most powerful critiques of the mess that is Britain's economy. -- Aditya Chakrabortty * Guardian *
Entertaining, vastly intelligent. * New Yorker *
This is the definitive account of how so much has gone and continue to go wrong with Britain's institutions. Don't read it all at once - it's too depressing. -- Joan Bakewell * New Statesman (Books of the Year) *
One of the country's finest writers. * GQ *
A Virtuoso [.] mixture of hard-won knowledge and literary flair. * Times Literary Supplement *
You don't have to be.excessively sentimental about the public service ethos to find the story Meek tells here genuinely shocking. -- Jonathan Derbyshire * Prospect *
Do yourself a favour: read Private Island and find out what has really happened in Britain over the past 20 years. -- John Gray * Guardian *
[A] devastating account of the privatisation dogma of the past 25 years ... As demolition jobs go, this can hardly be bettered. -- John Kampfner * Observer *
If you have a taste for historical irony & absurdity, you'll love this book. -- Francis Wheen * Mail on Sunday *
An energetic and colourfully told polemic against privatisation. * Financial Times *
James Meek's brilliant book, bracing in its detail and sweeping in its scope, makes clear just how central privatisation is to the story of contemporary Britain: some of it will make you sad, some of it will make you furious, but you are guaranteed to be left feeling that you understand this country much better. * John Lanchester, author of Capital and Whoops! *
One of the most powerful critiques of the mess that is Britain's economy. -- Aditya Chakrabortty * Guardian *
Entertaining, vastly intelligent. * New Yorker *
This is the definitive account of how so much has gone and continue to go wrong with Britain's institutions. Don't read it all at once - it's too depressing. -- Joan Bakewell * New Statesman (Books of the Year) *
One of the country's finest writers. * GQ *
A Virtuoso [.] mixture of hard-won knowledge and literary flair. * Times Literary Supplement *
You don't have to be.excessively sentimental about the public service ethos to find the story Meek tells here genuinely shocking. -- Jonathan Derbyshire * Prospect *
James Meek is a contributing editor of the London Review of Books. He is the author of six novels that have published in the UK, US, France and Germany, including The People's Act of Love, that was shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and won the Ondaatje Prize and Scottish Arts Council Award. We Are Now Beginning our Descent won the 2008 Le Prince Maurice Prize and The Heart Broke In was shortlisted for the 2012 Costa Prize. In 2004 he was named the Foreign Correspondent of the year by the British Press Awards and he contributes regularly to the Guardian, New York Times and International Herald Tribune. Website: www.jamesmeek.net
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781784782061 |
| ISBN 10 | 1784782068 |
| Title | Private Island |
| Author | James Meek |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Verso Books |
| Year published | 2015-04-06 |
| Number of pages | 272 |
| Prizes | Winner of Orwell Prize 2015 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |