George Orwell
25th June 1903 – 21st January 1950. British writer, journalist, essayist, socialist.
Biography Née Eric Arthur Blair, George Orwell was born in Motihari, Bengal in India. At the age of five, he moved to England together with his mother and two sisters. He got the chance to attend a boarding school on a scholarship. Between 1917 and 1921 he studied at Eton. Here he experienced the extreme propaganda of the Great War which made him reject pre-war values.
From 1922-1927 Orwell joined the Indian Civil Service in Burma. When he came back to England he had learned to hate the Empire as well as imperialism. This becomes obvious in his novel Burmese Days (1934) as well as in the essays “Shooting an Elephant” (1936) and “A Hanging” (1933).
After his return from India, Orwell worked on his career as a writer. He adopted his pen name which expresses his deep connection to his country; George is the patron saint of England, the River Orwell was one of his favourite places in Suffolk.
Between 1930 and 1935 he published three novels, numerous essays and book reviews as well as a semi-autobiographical documentary. All of them show Orwell’s anger at the injustices of the capitalist system. The publication of the novel The Road to Wigan Pier is said to be the turning point in Orwell’s life: “It made his reputation as a sharp critic of capitalism and it launched him on the road to his own eccentric brand of socialism.” (Rodden 2007, p. 3)
In 1937 Orwell went to Spain to fight for the Republicans in the Spanish Civil War. When he came back to England he joined the radical Independent Labour Party. Although he still believed in socialism, he disapproved of the Soviet Union. Directly after the Second World War Animal Farm was published (August 1945). Finally, this was the novel which made him famous. Being financially independent, he moved away from London to the island of Jura (Scottish west coast) in 1946. The dystopian novel Nineteen-Eighty-Four was published in 1949. It contains clear connections to events in the Soviet Union. Both Animal Farm and Nineteen-Eighty-Four have been forming in Orwell’s mind for years and work with many of his earlier experiences.
Reception of his works Nowadays, Orwell is much more present in Anglo-American culture than he was during his own lifetime. Especially his last two novels Animal Farm and Nineteen-Eighty-Four are still widely read. They were translated into 62 languages and about 50 million copies have been sold. Nevertheless, Orwell’s political legacy is controversial. As he was mainly a political writer during his lifetime, his last two novels are taken as political statements, prophesies or satires.
Sources:
Kerr, Douglas. George Orwell. Northcote House Publishers: Horndon 2003.
Rodden, John. A Cambridge Companion to George Orwell. CUP: Cambridge 2007.