"Poor People" by William T. Vollmann

314 pages

William T. Vollmann has never been poor, but as a journalist he has seen a lot of poor people. This got him thinking, so as he traveled around the world he began asking the impoverished a single question: "Why are you poor?" They responded in shocking different ways. For Buddhists in Thailand, the answer was simple: They had done something wrong in a previous life. Mexicans attributed their ill fortune to the misdoings of the rich; in Yemen, the poor refused to acknowledge their poverty because to do so would show ingratitude to Allah and make it seem like they weren't satisfied with what they had been given. The Japanese also tended to deny being poor, but for a different reason: personal shame. Vollmann's stories shed light on the complex factors that contribute to poverty in different parts of the world, with lots of photographs to illustrate what he's talking about.

This book does a great job of explaining different factors that create poverty and is especially good at humanizing the impoverished people he talked to and got to know. He took the time to get to know them so he could share their stories well, and the photographs also help the subjects feel real. One thing I don't like is that although the entire final section of the book is called "Hope," I really didn't feel hopeful at all at the conclusion of the book. It doesn't seem like any of the people he talked to were making progress toward getting out of poverty, and he doesn't offer any solutions or strategies for helping. I didn't expect him to find the answer, but I guess that the title of the last section got my hopes up for some kind of happy ending. Nevertheless, "Poor People" creates a well-rounded picture of poverty through a combination of in-depth research (Vollmann did LOTS--check out the works cited in the back) and personal anecdotes.