George Orwell was one of the most prolific political writers of this century. he published almost a dozen novels and numerous essays and other articles. He was born in India of middle-class English parents and was christened Eric Arthur Blair; he wrote under the name of George orwell from 1933 onward. Although he served in Burma as a member of the Indian Imperial Police from 1922-1927, he was educated and spent most of his adult life in England. Wounded in the Spanish Civil War, he considered himself a democratic socialist and hated totalitarianism of any kind, including Communism.

Orwell's autobiographical Down and Out in Paris and London (1933) describes his experiences on the streets or with low-paying jobs while he struggled with his writing. Burmese Days (1934) reflects his experiences in Burma as an officer of the Indian Imperial Police. Two of Orwell's best books grew out of his devotion to the poor and politically powerless: The Road to Wigan Pier (1937) is a hard-hitting documentary about unemployed and impoverished coal miners in northern England, and Homage to Catalonia (1938) tells about the author's experiences in the Spanish Civil War.

Later in his relatively short life, Orwell worked as a journalist and grew more and more disillusioned with the methods of Communism. As news of the cruelty and oppression of Joseph Stalin's government became known in the West, many people, Orwell included, believed that the bright promise of Communism had been betrayed. This idea is a major theme of Animal Farm.

Orwell's most popular books are his political satires, Animal Farm (1945) and1984(1949). The latter is a grim fantasy of life in the future totalitarian state. Winston Smith, the main character, longs for a better life, but he is easily crushed by the dreaded Big Brother and his Thought Police. 1984, like Animal Farm, is a warning about the possibility of a night-marish totalitarian future.

George Orwell suffered from tuberculosis for many years and died in 1950, one of the most powerful and influential political writers of this century.

Orwell Trivia (Impress your friends!)

• Orwell was born Eric Hugh Blair in 1903 in Motihari, Bengal, an area in eastern India only about three hundred miles from Burma, where Orwell was to serve twenty years later as a British civil servant.
• Orwell had a sister about five years old than he, and another five years younger, but he was never very close to them.
• In 1911, at a very early age, Orwell was sent back to England to begin his education.Orwell graduated from Eton at age eighteen, and rather unexpectedly, was to spend the next five years (1922-27) in Burma as an officer of the Indian Imperial Police.
• In 1945, Orwell's wife died as the result of a minor operation. He attributed her death to lowered physical resistance due to the war; both she and Orwell had consistently given up a part of their wartime food rations to feed children, and consequently had impaired their health.
• In 1949, he married Sonia Brownell, who assisted him in taking care of his adopted son.

On January 21, 1950, as he was about to leave for a sanitarium in Switzerland, he had a tubercular hemmorage and died.
 
 

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