Winner of the Orwell Prize 2018.
Darren McGarvey aka Loki grew up in Pollok. He is a writer, performer, columnist and former rapper-in-residence at Police Scotland's Violence Reduction Unit. He has presented eight programmes for BBC Scotland exploring the root causes of anti-social behaviour and social deprivation.
Part memoir, part polemic, this is a savage, wise and witty
tour-de-force. An unflinching account of the realities of systemic
poverty, Poverty Safari lays down challenges to both the left and
right. It is hard to think of a more timely, powerful or necessary
book.
*J.K. Rowling*
Nothing less than an intellectual and spiritual rehab manual for
the progressive left.
*Irvine Welsh*
Another cry of anger from a working class that feels the pain of a
rotten, failing system. Its value lies in the strength it will add
to the movement for change.
*Ken Loach*
Poverty Safari is an important and powerful book.
*Nicola Sturgeon*
Poverty Safari documents in vivid, piercing and frequently funny
prose, the reality of growing up in Pollok and the consequences of
a chaotic family life
*The Sunday Times*
By his own account, Darren McGarvey’s first twenty-five years were
a real-life version of Trainspotting . . . Poverty Safari [is] a
painfully honest autobiographical study of deprivation and how
society should deal with it . . . But what has made McGarvey such a
particular figure of attention is his political message . . .
[McGarvey] seems to offer an antidote to populist anger that
transcends left and right . . . his urgently written, articulate
and emotional book is a bracing contribution to the debate about
how to fix our broken politics.
*The Financial Times*
Poverty Safari is one of the best accounts of working-class life I
have read. McGarvey is a rarity: a working-class writer who has
fought to make the middle-class world hear what he has to say.
*The Guardian*
If The Road to Wigan Pier had been written by a Wigan miner and not
an Etonian rebel, this is what might have been achieved. McGarvey’s
book takes you to the heart of what is wrong with the society free
market capitalism has created.
*Paul Mason*
The man seems to be on his way to becoming one of the most
compelling and original voices in Scotland’s, and maybe Britain’s,
public debate. If Scotland’s underclass could speak in a single,
articulate, authentic voice to communicate to the rest of us what
it’s like to be poor, isolated, brutalised, lost, it would sound
very much like this.
*Scottish Daily Mail*
Raw, powerful and challenging.
*Kezia Dugdale*
A blistering analysis of the issues facing the voiceless and the
social mechanisms that hobble progress, all wrapped up in an
unput-downable memoir.
*Denise Mina*
Describes in unflinching detail the realities of growing up poor in
Britain and sets out to challenge the various ways in which poverty
is represented in the media and on both sides of the political
divide
*The Guardian*
A raw account of his own deprivation and addiction and a powerful
political argument.
*The Guardian*
The standout, authentic voice of a generation . . . the world is
looking for eloquent voices like McGarvey's to explain things
*The Herald (Scotland)*
Utterly compelling.
*The New Statesman*
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