The Victorian House - Domestic Life from Childbirth to Deathbed

London: Harper Collins, 2003. A near Fine unmarked copy which has light bumping to corner tips with dustjacket which is price clipped. lii + 476 pages. 36 main illustrations and 55 illustrations in the text. Coloured pictorial endpapers. The Victorian age is both recent and unimaginably distant. In the most prosperous and technologically advanced nation in the world, people carried slops up and down stairs; buried meat in fresh earth to prevent mould forming; wrung sheets out in boiling water with their bare hands. This drudgery was routinely performed by the parents of people still living. Running water, stoves, flush toilets - even toilet paper - arrived slowly throughout the century; and most were luxuries available only to the prosperous. An incisive portrait of Victorian domestic, life portrayed through a collage of diaries, letters, advice books, magazines and paintings, the author shows how social history is built up of tiny domestic details. Laid out like a house, following the story of daily life from room to room. **** NOT EX LIB **** PLEASE NOTE: A HEAVY VOLUME OF 0.885 KILO UNPACKED WEIGHT WHICH MAY REQUIRE EXTRA SHIPPING COST D4B. First Edition. Hard Cover. Near Fine/Near Fine. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.