Orwell and Animal Farm

It is interesting that the prosaic reason why the MOI might not be that keen on Animal Farm being published was of course, that it would mean that it would be them that would get it in the neck from the Russians and not Orwell, safely tucked away in his farm in the Scottish Highlands. I'll bet they took one look at it and said to themselves "I could well do without the hassle of the Soviet Cultural attaché banging on at me about this for the next  few months, lets put a lid on it"

Never attribute to malice what can be passed of as wanting an easy ride...Or something

Thanks for the link. Historically interesting, but not sure it would have added to the book.

It could have done with a significant amount of proofreading and editing

First two mistakes I’ve noticed are due to a poor digitisation of the text shown in the image… so I’m not ready to blame the writer.

I have a version of AF with colour illustrations throughout by Gerald Scarfe… now that does add something!

Most people are not familiar with:

Down and Out in London and Paris.

by Orwell.

Absolute dynamite.

Also collected essays in two volumes, including 'Politics and the English language', essential reading for anyone aspiring to journalism/media, Keep the Aspidestra Flying, Homage to Catalonia. All good stuff.

‘Politics and the English language’

I this at work and am regularly tempted to hit people around their heads with it.

Keep the Aspidistra Flying was the first Orwell novel I read. I got it from the school library and remember thinking it made adulthood seem quite bleak.

I’m always amazed at how the suburban life he describes in The Power and The Glory could be modern suburban life nearly 100 years later.

I think you'll find that was Graham Greene

Doh - I meant Coming up for air!

Supernova your point still stands though.
Orwell wrote in a style that seems timeless and relevant today as it did when published

England your England sums up the country perfectly today, and it was written in 1940 I think

If you want a Christmas read, his diaries are excellent and worth getting hold of

"Most people are not familiar with:

Down and Out in London and Paris."

Is that a sequal to Down and Out in Paris and London?

came across a New York Times article today that’s published the Preface that Orwell wrote, but which was removed before it was published, and it’s a fascinating read, and especially so with regards to what’s going on politically.

Orwell had a lot of pressure from the left wing not to publish anything critical of socialism. He was a committed socialist and fought in the Spansish Civil War against the fascists, but then had to flee for his life when the communists rounded up non-communist anti-fascists and shot them. Orwell reported on that and had no illusions that Stalin and the other communist leaders were murderous tyrants, but that didn't fit with the narrative that Western socialists wanted to tell about the workers paradise that they imagined the Soviet Union was.

Before the tankies arrive and denounce Orwell as a right-winger, he wasn't, he was a committed socialist and hated totalitarians on both the right and left (lets face it, Animal Farm is basically horseshoe theory). The delusional left-wing criticized Orwell because they felt that, as a socialist, he should not publish any criticism of other socialists, not because anyone back then thought he was a right-winger.

The other huge misunderstanding about Orwell is that people think 1984 was a futuristic dystopia. It wasn't, it was Orwell describing the world of the late 1940s, with neighbours constantly watching, waiting to denounce you for petty infringements against the social order.

Absolutely. He came under the influence of Max Schachtman, an American Trotskyist, who regarded Stalin's USSR as a greater threat to the working class than the Nazis and this corresponded with Orwell's experience in Spain.

His writings on the suburban petty bourgeoisie were very droll and completely relevant today.

This probably pertains more to 1984 than to Animal Farm, but I often think that people miss the point with Orwell. 1984, for example, is not about foreseeing cameras everywhere, or about state control; it’s about a collective psyche that permits an anti-human narrative to dominate the social order, and how that comes about.

Orwell was as much about critiquing the collective English mind as he was about critiquing Soviet-style socialist excesses.

Orwell was as much about critiquing the collective English mind

He also didn't think that "English democracy" as it existed in 1939 would survive the war, and 1984 is written from that perspective also.

It could have done with a significant amount of proofreading and editing

It intrigued me that despite leaving all the OCR errors in, the NYT had managed to change it to US spelling. Since it was never published, I doubt it was Orwell who changed that.

the NYT had managed to change it to US spelling.

The spellchecker just removed Unwords

I can't conjure up this preface. Like Rishi a bit lol-tech-bro. Anyone help me with a link?

I think both 1984 and Animal Farm should be mandatory reading for all secondary school kids. 

Great comments here from thols2, BillMC and SaxonRider. 

I always found it interesting that Orwell (who had a very interesting life full stop!) actually chose to immerse himself in the East End of London, to gain empathy with the very poorest and most deprived in society. Whilst he may have had relative privilege to fall back on, he still put himself through suffering hardship in a way I doubt many could endure. Pretty courageous in my view, having grown up in the East End myself. And I often wonder what Orwell would have thought about what has happened to Tower House, his home for a period, which has been converted to luxury flats:<br /><br />

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2004/oct/24/housingpolicy.books