Anachronous. Interesting, but not gripping. A weird bit of travelogue with no plot; one can't call Down and Out in Paris and London a novel or any type of traditional fiction. It is, instead, simply an account of time spent among the underclass in early-twentieth-century Paris and London. Time spent destitute and sometimes homeless. It is a journal and a diary peppered with exposition on the plight of the bums, tramps, panhandlers, and hawkers Orwell meets and befriends during this brief period in his life.
The book is roughly divided into two parts, not surprisingly; one is a catalogue of experiences down and out in Paris, the second is its counterpart in London. The two halves are separated by the channel, but united thematically by the protagonist's job search and struggles to find food and lodging for the pittance he is able to scrape from loans and intermittent work. In Paris, the works he is able to find, after days of standing cold and hungry outside back doors hoping to catch managers and hustle them, is in the hotel and hospitality industry-working as the lowest of the low both figuratively and literally. His first job lands him in a sub-basement kitchen taking orders. He is a plongeur--basically a dishwasher, but also a jack-of-all-menial-trades, making food, coffee, tea, cleaning up, serving meals to the waiters at the hotel restaurant, and a host of other jobs for which is poorly paid and earns no respect. This lack of respect from the upper echelons of the hotel staff, and from every echelon of Paris society causes him to feel degraded and hopeless, and Orwell spends a good deal of the text in this portion expounding and philosophizing on the larger social implications of working men so long and so hard that they have neither the energy nor the desire to improve their station or enjoy their themselves, essentially relegating them to dirty, backbreaking labor for the entirety of their short, miserable lives. For his compatriots in this lifestyle, the only moments of happiness are brief periods of drunkenness or debauchery at public houses.

In London the essential difficulties are the same. The protagonist is looked down on by society because of his appearance, and he spends much of his time hungry and tired. In the London section, employment is less a concern than it was in Paris. Orwell repatriated after receiving word from a friend that a job was available for him. Unfortunately, the job has been delayed. So, then, the problem is not finding work, but merely waiting out the delay on what little money he has brought over or can scrounge in the meantime.
Orwell's friend is kind enough to loan him some money, but because he cannot in good faith completely freeload on this fellow's generosity, and because the job he counts on will not come through for more than a month, Orwell sells his clothes and replaces them with rags in order to better economize, and he spends a good part of his waiting period walking all over England as a tramp.
He delves at some length into the causes of tramping and the effects it has on English society and on those who must do it. Because the country's system of "spikes", or homeless shelters, does not allow indigent people to spend more than one night in any region's bunks per month (theoretically to reduce the incentive to live off the state's welfare system), tramps are forced to walk from one area to the next in order to be fed and housed. But because this wears out their clothes and spirits, and does not allow them time to work and earn a living, it also keeps them from re-entering society's good graces by ensuring they remain poor and exhausted, and that all their energy is wasted walking the country side with no hope of improving their condition save quick-fixes like petty crime.
Once his funds have been depleted, Orwell finally resolves to borrow more money from his friend, and sets himself up in London proper. He stays in dingy flop houses run by various unscrupulous landlords who cram too many men into too-tight spaces or self-righteous charitable organizations that impose unreasonable regulations on those unfortunate enough to need their assistance. During these times, Orwell details the various kinds of beggars and street hustlers in London and the subtle differences in their rank and motives that would be indistinguishable to the prejudiced onlooker who merely lumps all transients and panhandlers into the same underclass and writes them all off.
Finally, the job comes through for Orwell, and the text ends abruptly.

The text is probably part honest and part embellishment. History tells us that Wells did, in fact spend time doing precisely as the book describes, living in hovels, working for a pittance and generally being mistrusted by polite society on account of his shabby clothes. But it is unlikely that his journals from this period are as rich as his following account. All in all, Wells is probably creating the story he remembers, with the concomitant emotions and insinuations, and one forgives him if strict historical accuracy is sacrificed from time to time.
I wonder if some of Orwell's indigence was voluntary. With money available from a friend who seems perfectly willing to give it to him in London, Orwell instead chooses to spend time tramping. Down and Out occasionally seems like a prince's account of dressing up in pauper's clothing to mix with the common people. Here, he runs the risk of developing a condescending contact with the underclass he claims to understand and represent without prejudice. His apologist exposition, then, becomes a bit of the "humble savage" narrative, and runs the risk of re-inscribing old prejudices, or inscribing new ones.

Without a dramatic arc, or the other props of narrative, Down and Out can't benefit from the dramatic amplification of that mode. Instead, Orwell goes for a sort of journalistic attitude, trying, instead, to give the impression of describing the life he shared as it was. This method may not be as intense as narrative, but it borrows the shock value of documentary. By dissociating itself with fiction, it also dissociates itself with the assumption of exaggeration. In Orwell's account, the threadbare clothes, the dehumanizing conditions of the spikes may not be horrific, but they are real, and we must deal with their implications, not dismiss them as dramatic devices.
Orwell pairs this documentary style with bits of social critique whose aim is twofold. On the one hand, he tries to highlight the diverse and complex society of the underclass, so that those who are caught in it can be re-humanized in the eyes of those who have de-humanized them. On the other hand, he hopes to explain how the cycle of poverty and the system of welfare is keeping the poor poor, rather than lifting them out of their poverty.
It is Orwell's hope that by reminding "polite society" that these "dregs" are human beings with morals and intelligence and not just criminals and loafers who are getting their desserts, he can induce society to take an interest in helping them. If the upper classes did not write these men and women off, and instead felt a common humanity with them, he argues, real policies could be advanced that would bring real solutions, instead of the finger-in-the-dam policies in place that are borne out of resentment and self-righteousness on the part of the bourgeoisie.
Orwell's propositions are essentially hopes, and his ideas, he admits, are merely opinions and conjecture. These are, after all, the same issues that have confronted social theorists and liberal societies the world over since the Industrial Revolution: how to effectively and humanely care for those who have been rejected by society, and live on its fringes. There are prejudices to overcome and realities to face. Orwell hopes to be play a role in this effort by "re-humanizing" and "re-moralizing" those who have been "de-humanized" and "de-moralized".
Orwell takes special pains to describe a variety of characters for this purpose. Some are lovable, many are vile. Orwell, contends, though, that what drives these people to their rotten behavior (including contempt for the bourgeoisie, which isn't perhaps so despicable) is the poor breaks society has afforded them. The men are degraded by their inability to marry, and when it does not drive them to despair, it drives them prostitutes. The men have been trodden upon by the rich, and so they look for any way to harm them-pissing in their soup, dropping their food, cursing them behind their backs, stealing from them. Orwell's depictions are very frequently negative, but during long passages of critique, he blames society's iniquity, rather than any failing of character on the part of the poor. This seems to be Orwell's concern, that we should be reminded that poverty does not simply work on ones stomach, but on one's spirit.

One could say, and might hope for Owell's sake, that the unremarkable character of Down and Out to a contemporary audience is a testament to its success in its day, having spawned a genre of documentary social critique. And yet, such is not the case, for the book participates in a tradition going back to Dickens and before, rather than blazing a new trail itself. This genre has effected great change, but Orwell's role in it, as far as Down and Out goes, is likely minimal. One can, and should, say in his defense, however, that this is a young work and consider it formative-practice-and note that he went on to write much more influential social critiques, such as Animal Farm and 1984.
Still, there are one or two things to be said for it. Orwell was changed by his experience, and he hopes that by publishing his descriptions of it, he can reach an audience who may never share that experience, and pass on some of the lessons he learned to the public that, as he sees it, sorely needs it. For Orwell, the his new direction means he:

"shall never again think that all tramps are drunken scoundrels, nor expect a beggar to be grateful when I give him a penny, nor be surprised if men out of work lack energy, nor subscribe to the Salvation Army, nor pawn my clothes, nor refuse a handbill, nor enjoy a meal at a smart restaurant. That is a beginning" (213).

And that lesson is probably just as relevant today--always--as it was when Orwell learned it.