In the last forty years, Eric Hobsbawm's writings on labor history, working people, and social protest have helped open new fields of study and secured his position as "the best known living historian in the world" (The Times, London). This engaging collection features twenty-six Hobsbawm essays covering the history of working men and women between the late eighteenth century and today, bringing back into print Hobsbawm's pioneering studies in labor history along with more recent previously unpublished pieces. Uncommon People shows the range of Hobsbawm's work, on such subjects as the formation of the British working class, revolution and sex, and socialism and the avant garde. From essays on Mario Puzo and the Mafia, to the Sicilian bandit Salvatore Giuliano and the cultural consequences of Christopher Columbus runs Hobsbawm's passionate concern for the lives and struggles of ordinary men and women.