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Hemingway is the quintessential action-oriented writer, the writer who jumps into the fray, but after reading these essays, I'd put Orwell in a virtual tie. Orwell's first job as an adult was serving the British Empire as an overseer in Burma, where he learned to hate the racism and represssion that was at the heart of the Empire. Later, Orwell fought with the communists in Spain, and then he was in London during the bombings of WWII. Many of the essays in this collection deal with his experiences in those dangerous, radical, intense times. He writes about being cowed into shooting an escaped elephant in Burma because he had to look decisive in front of several thousand Burmese subjects. He writes about accusing a dark-skinned country boy of theft in the Spanish-Franco war, only to see that his accusation was incorrect, and then finding ways to make amends (and noting that he would not have had the nerve to make amends, nor would his efforts have been accepted, except in the unreality of wartime). He writes about opposing Fascism as WWII loomed, and his contempt for the pro-communist and pro-socialist intellectuals who shifted from one position to another as the political winds blew. These are searing, angry essays, full of tight observations about the duplicity of people with power and the powerlessness of the working class. Many other other essays in the book also deal with power, but through very different lenses. For example, the collection opens with his long, multi-part memoir of life as a scholarship student at a public school. His tales are not especially different than those told by others about the harsh, class-conscious atmosphere and the sadistic headmasters, inadequate food rations, and uncomfortable living conditions. Yet Orwell teases out some fascinating intellectual observations, too. For example, he talks about wetting his bed, and then being told that it was a sin and being caned for it: his comment is that he learned he had sinned without even wanting to sin. Same thing with masturbation, which he wasn't doing, but which he was accused of doing because he was a poor boy. Here he was marked as a sinner for something he wasn't actually even doing and didn't even understand at the time. Then, Orwell turns his attention in several essays to literary criticism and language. He looks at Dickens from a socialist point of view and finds that socialists are seeking a perspective that just isn't there. Orwell sees Dickens as a master at pointing out social ills, especially as they are visited on children, but utterly lacking in any solutions for the problems. Dickens basically asks the question, "Can't we all just get along?" and he sees individual morality as the only way to improve appalling social conditions. Orwell points out that it's hard to decide which comes first -- better social conditions or better morality -- though certainly some level of safety and creature comforts are needed before humanity has the luxury of thinking about "higher" matters. About language, he finds parallels between sloppy, cliched language and sloppy thinking and dishonest political discourse. It's a point that is fairly common today, but which he probably striking in its time. In fact, the essays are full of observations that seem remarkably fresh for having been made in the 1930s. One other essay was compelling for me: Gandhi. Orwell doesn't revere Gandhi as a saint, but he has more complimentary things to say about him than about any other person in the essays. He points out the remarkable achievement of India's independence, even if Gandhi's fullest dreams for a peaceful independence were not realized. He points out Gandhi's openness to all people and his raw physical courage (which cost him his life because he refused to have bodyguards). And he points out the limits of pacifism in a world in which totalitarian regimes would take advantage of pacifists to simply wipe them out. These essays are so remarkable that I will read more Orwell essays in the future. Just as importantly, the essays have made me determined to read more about some of the events and people who are discussed in them. I have read a lot of Dickens, but I haven't read Kipling, and I know little about Gandhi or the Spanish Civil War. So Orwell has not only opened my mind with his essays, but he has propelled me to learn about new things.
Detailed Information
| Author: | George Orwell |
|---|---|
| Publication Year: | 1970 |
| ISBN: | 156186004 |
| Pages: | 7 |
| Language: | English |
| File Size: | 0.037 |
| Format: | |
| Price: | FREE |
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