Books by George Orwell

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Book SynopsisIncluding Animal Farm''Orwell is the most influential political writer of the twentieth century'' New York Review of BooksThroughout his life George Orwell aimed, in his words, to make ''political writing into an art''. This collection brings together the best of his matchless political essays and journalism with his timeless satire on totalitarianism, Animal Farm. It includes articles on subjects from the corruption of language to the oppressive British Empire; his masterly wartime Socialist polemic, ''The Lion and the Unicorn''; a wry review of Mein Kampf; a defence of Nineteen Eighty-Four; and extracts from his controversial list of ''Crypto-Communists''. Together these works demonstrate Orwell''s commitment to telling the truth, however unpalatable, and doing so with artistry and humanity.Edited by Peter Davison with an Introduction by Timothy Garton Ash

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Book SynopsisThis annotation edition of Orwell's well-known satire is perfectfor students and Orwell enthusiasts alike. Extra wide margins anddouble spacing leaves lots of room for notes. Contains top tipson effective annotation and different revision techniques.

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Book SynopsisThis beautiful jacketed hardback edition presents George Orwell''s classic allegorical tale with new full-colour illustrations by Victor McLindon and patterned endpapers.Revolution is in the air at Manor Farm after old Major, a prize boar, tells the other animals about his dream of freedom. Mr Jones, the drunken farmer, is deposed and a committee of pigs takes over the running of the farm. But the dream turns sour, the purges begin, and those in charge come more and more to resemble their oppressors. With a series of delightful illustrations that bring the author''s vivid gallery of character to life, Orwell''s satire of totalitarianism remails as lucid and compelling as ever, conveying the truth about how we are manipulated through language and the impossibility of finding heaven on earth.

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Book SynopsisThree francs will feed you till tomorrow, and you cannot think further than thatAs a young man struggling to find his voice as a writer, George Orwell left the comfort of home to live in the impoverished working districts of Paris and London. He would document both the chaos and boredom of destitution, the eccentric cast of characters he encountered, and the near-constant pains of hunger and discomfort.Exposing the grim reality of a life marred by poverty, Down and Out in Paris and London, part memoir, part social commentary, would become George Orwell's first published work.

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Book SynopsisIn these timeless and witty essays George Orwell explores the English love of reading about a good murder in the papers (and laments the passing of the heyday of the ''perfect'' murder involving class, sex and poisoning), as well as unfolding his trenchant views on everything from boys'' weeklies to naughty seaside postcards.

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell''s vivid memoir of his time living among the desperately poor and destitute, Down and Out in Paris and London is a moving tour of the underworld of society.''You have talked so often of going to the dogs - and well, here are the dogs, and you have reached them.'' Written when Orwell was a struggling writer in his twenties, it documents his ''first contact with poverty''. Here, he painstakingly documents a world of unrelenting drudgery and squalor - sleeping in bug-infested hostels and doss houses of last resort, working as a dishwasher in Paris''s vile ''Hôtel X'', surviving on scraps and cigarette butts, living alongside tramps, a star-gazing pavement artist and a starving Russian ex-army captain. Exposing a shocking, previously-hidden world to his readers, Orwell gave a human face to the statistics of poverty for the first time - and in doing so, found his voice as a writer.Trade ReviewThe white-hot reaction of a sensitive, observant, compassionate young man to poverty -- Dervla MurphyOrwell was the great moral force of his age * Spectator *

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Book SynopsisEric Arthur Blair (1903-1950), better known by his pen-name, George Orwell, was born in India, where his father worked for the Civil Service. An author and journalist, Orwell was one of the most prominent and influential figures in twentieth-century literature. His unique political allegory Animal Farm was published in 1945, and it was this novel, together with the dystopia of Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), which brought him world-wide fame. His novels and non-fiction include Burmese Days, Down and Out in Paris and London, The Road to Wigan Pier and Homage to Catalonia.Trade ReviewA completely harrowing and stark account of poverty ... written in clear and violent language -- Cyril Connolly

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Book SynopsisOrwell was one of the most celebrated essayists in the English language, and there are quite a few of his essays which are probably better known than any of his other writings apart from Aminal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four.Table of ContentsIntroduction Note on the Text Select Bibliography A Chronology of George Orwell Selected Essays Shooting an elephant (1936) Inside the whale (1940) Charles Dickens (1940) Boys' weeklies (1940) The art of Donald McGill (1941) Wells, Hitler and the world state (1941) Rudyard Kipling (1942) Raffles and Miss Blandish (1944) In defence of P.G. Wodehouse (1945) Notes on nationalism (1945) The prevention of literature (1946) Decline of the English murder (1946) Politics and the English language (1946) Confessions of a book reviewer (1946) Why I write (1946) Politics vs literature: an examination of Gulliver's Travels (1946) How the poor die (1946) Lear, Tolstoy and the Fool (1947) Writers and Leviathan (1948) Explanatory Notes

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Book SynopsisNOMINATED CILIP KATE GREENAWAY MEDALAll animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.It's just an ordinary farm until the animals revolt. They get rid of the irresponsible farmer. The other animals are sure that life is improving, but as systems are replaced and half-truths are retold, a new hierarchy emerges . . .Orwell's tale of propaganda, power and greed has never felt more pertinent.With an exciting new cover and inside illustrations by superstar Chris Mould.''Heartily recommend.' Just ImagineNever been so timely . . . simply striking illustrations.' Armadillo MagazineAtmospheric and deliciously macabre.' Lancashire PostPerfectly pitched.' WRD MagazineTrade Review'A narrative as individual as it is apt in political parody.' - Kirkus Reviews'A stunning new illustrated edition of a classic tale. Mould . . . is equal to the big themes the story presents, creating unforgettable images for this unforgettable fable. This is a book that will appeal to readers of all ages, and every child should know this story.' - LoveReading4Kids on The Iron Man

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Book Synopsis''You can live on a shilling a day in Paris if you know how. But it is a complicated business''As a struggling writer in his twenties, Orwell lived as a down-and-out among the poorest members of society. In this, his early memoir, Orwell recalls with vivid clarity his time working as a penniless dishwasher in Paris, pawning clothes to buy a day''s worth of bread and wine, sleeping in bug-infested bunks, trading survival skills and cigarette butts with fellow tramps, and trudging between London''s workhouse spikes for a few hours'' sleep and tea. With all of the sensitivity and compassion that Orwell is known and loved for, he exposed the hardships of poverty and gave readers an unprecedented look at life lived on the fringes of society.This vivid account is an enduring call to support the world''s most vulnerable people and exemplifies his belief that ''The greatest of evils and the worst of crimes is poverty.''WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY KERRY HUDSON

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Book SynopsisThe essential collection of critical essays from a twentieth-century master and author of 1984.As a critic, George Orwell cast a wide net.

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Book SynopsisWAR IS PEACEFREEDOM IS SLAVERYIGNORANCE IS STRENGTH Winston Smith is a good worker. He supports the Party. He is good at his job rewriting history to Government specification. Big Brother watches him, but there is nothing to see.Winston''s struggle against the totalitarian world he inhabits is a closely guarded secret. It exists only in his mind until he begins a secret love affair with Julia, a fellow worker. Is this enough to push him to revolution? Or is it the beginning of his downfall?A masterwork of dystopian fiction, Nineteen Eighty-Four is harrowingly prescient, and its impact has stretched around the globe.With a new introduction by political editor and writer Ian Dunt, this brand new edition of a science fiction classic is a must-have for any collector.

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Book Synopsis''Shooting an Elephant'' is Orwell''s searing and painfully honest account of his experience as a police officer in imperial Burma; killing an escaped elephant in front of a crowd ''solely to avoid looking a fool''. The other masterly essays in this collection include classics such as ''My Country Right or Left'', ''How the Poor Die'' and ''Such, Such were the Joys'', his memoir of the horrors of public school, as well as discussions of Shakespeare, sleeping rough, boys'' weeklies and a spirited defence of English cooking. Opinionated, uncompromising, provocative and hugely entertaining, all show Orwell''s unique ability to get to the heart of any subject.A collection of witty and incisive non-fiction, George Orwell''s Shooting an Elephant includes an introduction by Jeremy Paxman in Penguin Modern Classics.Table of ContentsWhy I write; the spike; a hanging; shooting an elephant; bookshop memories; Charles Dickens; boy's weeklies; my country right or left; looking back on the Spanish War; n defense of English cooking; good bad books; the sporting spirit; nonsense poetry; the prevention of literature; books versus cigarettes; decline of the English murder; some thoughts on the common toad; confessions of a book reviewer; politics versus literature - an examination of "Gulliver's Travels"; how the poor die; such, such were the joys; reflections on Gandhi.

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Book Synopsis'Orwell was the great moral force of his age' SpectatorYou can live on a shilling a day in Paris if you know how. But it is a complicated business.When he was a struggling writer in his twenties, George Orwell lived as a down-and-out among the poorest members of society. In this early memoir, he recounts shocking experiences working as a penniless dishwasher in Paris, pawning clothes to buy a day's worth of bread and wine, sleeping in bug-infested bunks, trading survival skills and cigarette butts with fellow tramps, and trudging between London's workhouse spikes for a few hours' sleep and tea-and-two-slices. With sensitivity and compassion, Orwell exposed the hardships of poverty and gave readers an unprecedented look at life lived on the fringes of society. His vivid account is an enduring call to support the world's most vulnerable people and exemplifies his belief that 'The greatest of evils and the worst of crimes is poverty.' The Authoritative Text. With a new introduction by Kerry Hudson.*The jacket of this stunning hardback edition features period artwork by Elizabeth Friedlander, one of Europe's pre-eminent 20th-century graphic designers. Look out for complementjary editions of Orwell's essential works Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four.*Trade ReviewAn extraordinary and curious book: beautifully phrased, meticulous, honest and funny. George Orwell’s 1933 memoir, and a study of poverty, is a book both rooted in its era and able to transcend it... a book that has inspired countless people to try to understand the personal and political issues at the heart of homelessness – and continues to do so today. -- Hannah PriceThe white-hot reaction of a sensitive, observant, compassionate young man to poverty'Orwell was the great moral force of his age * Spectator *

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Book SynopsisA new edition with a new introduction, this is a deeply personal record of Orwell's growing despair and disillusionment with the Spanish Civil War, gathering themes he would later explore to perfection in Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Having joined the international leftist forces in Barcelona, Orwell grew frustrated by the repressive totalitarianism of Stalin's brand of communism.

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell set out 'to make political writing into an art', and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature - his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell's essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. Fearing that England was about to be wiped from the face of the earth by the Nazi bombers flying overhead, Orwell put pen to paper and set out to make a record of English culture. England Your England, the sixth in the Orwell's Essays series, is this record, and is an important tableau of the nation's history, and demonstrates a resolute refusal to bow to the threatening forces of Fascism.Trade Review'A writer who can - and must - be rediscovered with every age.' (Irish Times) 'It just keeps being horribly relevant.' (David Olusoga, The Guardian)

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Book SynopsisApril, 1984. Winston Smith thinks a thought, starts a diary, and falls in love. But Big Brother is watching him, and the door to Room 101 can swing open in the blink of an eye.Its ideas have become our ideas, and Orwell's fiction is often said to be our reality. The definitive book of the 20th century is re-examined in a radical new adaptation exploring why Orwell's vision of the future is as relevant as ever.

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Book SynopsisEric Arthur Blair (1903-1950), better known by his pen-name, George Orwell, was born in India, where his father worked for the Civil Service. An author and journalist, Orwell was one of the most prominent and influential figures in twentieth-century literature. His unique political allegory Animal Farm was published in 1945, and it was this novel, together with the dystopia of Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), which brought him world-wide fame. His novels and non-fiction include Burmese Days, Down and Out in Paris and London, The Road to Wigan Pier and Homage to Catalonia.Trade ReviewAnyone who wants to understand the twentieth century will still have to read Orwell -- Timothy Garton Ash, * New York Review of Books *

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell set out ‘to make political writing into an art’, and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature – his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell’s essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. On Reading, the seventh in the Orwell’s Essays series, collects together Orwell’s short essays on books – ‘Bookshop Memories’, ‘Good Bad Books’, ‘Nonsense Poetry’, ‘Books vs. Cigarettes’ and ‘Confessions of a Book Reviewer’ – giving a rounded view of the great writer’s opinions on the literature of his day, and the vessels in which it was sold.Table of Contents‘Bookshop Memories’, ‘Good Bad Books’, ‘Nonsense Poetry’, ‘Books vs. Cigarettes’, ‘Confessions of a Book Reviewer’, Note on the Text, Notes

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell was an inveterate keeper of diaries. The Orwell Diaries presents eleven of them, covering the period 1931-1949, and follows Orwell from his early years as a writer to his last literary notebook. An entry from 1931 tells of a communal shave in the Trafalgar Square fountains, while notes from his travels through industrial England show the development of the impassioned social commentator. This same acute power of observation is evident in his diaries from Morocco, as well as at home, where his domestic diaries chart the progress of his garden and animals with a keen eye; the wartime diaries, from descriptions of events overseas to the daily violence closer to home, describe astutely his perspective on the politics of both, and provide a new and entirely refreshing insight into Orwell''s character and his great works.

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Book SynopsisUnfailingly elegant and endlessly relevant, the four essays in this collection treat literature as a vital record of our political hypocrisies, our social failings, and the ennobling limits of our ideological aspirations. Delving into the literary canon, George Orwell encounters dusty classics and lesser-known works of literature on his own exhilarating terms. The novels of Henry Miller lead him inside the belly of Jonah's whale, an imagined refuge in a time of total war. A trenchant investigation of Charles Dickens unfolds into a poignant portrait of nineteenth-century liberalism. A minor pamphlet on Shakespeare by Tolstoy provokes a stirring evocation of humanism and the excessive vitality of life. A series of singularly thrilling reading experiences, they celebrate Orwell's engagement with the world of writers and literature.

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Book SynopsisA deluxe 75th anniversary edition of the most iconic British novel of the twentieth century, with an introduction by Sandra Newman, author of Julia and exclusive archival material

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Book SynopsisThis is Orwell''s memoir of his experiences during the Spanish Civil War - a groundbreaking work of dissident literature drawn from vivid personal experience. There are occasions where it pays better to fight and be beaten than not to fight at all...Both a memoir of Orwell''s experiences during the Spanish Civil War and a heartfelt tribute to those who died, Homage to Catalonia is an extraordinary first-hand record of his time on the frontline. Written with all of the depth, passion and deep human understanding that defines Orwell''s writing this is a vivid account of the battles that were faced by ordinary working people as they fought for both their lives and their ideologies.Although Orwell was himself near-fatally wounded he finds both bleak and comic notes in his experience which is recorded with such clarity and depth that this short work has become one of his best known.''The finest model of how to write about a foreign conflict, a war or a revolution... Brilliant reportage'' Timothy Garten-Ash ''[Orwell] describes what is happening in Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War in such a way that we are able to see why he's so upset about Soviet power. His argument is not one of category and concept but of irresistible observation'' Timothy Snyder''When he went to Spain, [Orwell] was an unknown. He wasn't Hemingway. He wasn't a well-connected intellectual. He just had this amazing eye for detail. He was an amazing observer, and he could write so powerfully. This book, to me, is just one of the classics of foreign reporting'' Guy Raz

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell set out ‘to make political writing into an art’, and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature – his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell’s essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. In Politics and the English Language, the second in the Orwell’s Essays series, Orwell takes aim at the language used in politics, which, he says, ‘is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind’. In an age where the language used in politics is constantly under the microscope, Orwell’s Politics and the English Language is just as relevant today, and gives the reader a vital understanding of the tactics at play.Trade Review'Anybody who wants to write better will learn much from this essay… It is simultaneously hilarious and a dreadful warning.' (Allan Massie, The Scotsman) 'A writer who can – and must – be rediscovered with every age.' (Irish Times)Table of ContentsPolitics and the English Language, Note on the Text, Notes, A Brief Biographical Sketch of George Orwell

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Book SynopsisWhen the downtrodden animals of Manor Farm overthrow their master Mr Jones and take over the farm themselves, they imagine it is the beginning of a life of freedom and equality.Trade ReviewWhere this Oxford University Press edition hugely scores is with the ancillary content [..] these enable you to dig into the detail of the story's foundations, understand what Orwell was getting at and just what he was criticising. * Jonathan Cowie, SF2 Concatenation *Table of ContentsIntroduction Note on the Text Select Bibliography Chronology Animal Farm Explanatory Notes

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Book SynopsisOne of a series of fiction titles for schools. In Orwell's classic story the animals, led by the pigs Napoleon and Snowball, drive out Farmer Jones and set up an Animals' Republic in which all are to be free and equal. But the saviours turn out to be just as greedy, vain and oppressive.

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Book SynopsisA searing account of George Orwell''s observations of working-class life in the bleak industrial heartlands of Yorkshire and Lancashire in the 1930s, The Road to Wigan Pier is a brilliant and bitter polemic that has lost none of its political impact over time. His graphically unforgettable descriptions of social injustice, cramped slum housing, dangerous mining conditions, squalor, hunger and growing unemployment are written with unblinking honesty, fury and great humanity. It crystallized the ideas that would be found in Orwell''s later works and novels, and remains a powerful portrait of poverty, injustice and class divisions in Britain.Published with an introduction by Richard Hoggart in Penguin Modern Classics.''It is easy to see why the book created and still creates so sharp an impact ... exceptional immediacy, freshness and vigour, opinionated and bold ... Above all, it is a study of poverty and, behind that, of the strength of class-divisTrade ReviewTrue genius ... all his anger and frustration found their first proper means of expression in Wigan Pier -- Peter Ackroyd * The Times *

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Book SynopsisA biting satire on dictatorship written during the Second World War and published in 1945, ANIMAL FARM is perhaps the most celebrated twentieth-century English satire after the same writer's NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR. One of the very few writers to be compared in power, artistry and moral authority with Jonathan Swift, the purity of Orwell's spare prose and the logic of his dark comedy emphasize the stark message of man's inhumanity to man and beast's to beast

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Book SynopsisThe animals at Manor Farm have had enough of Farmer Jones-he''s drunk, reckless and cares little for their welfare. When the boar, Old Major, shares his revolutionary plans, the animals are convinced they can thrive on their own once the despot Jones is overthrown. But as the pigs vie for power, they begin to bear an uncanny resemblance to the tyrants they have overthrown ... George Orwell''s renowned fable became an instant success on publication after the Second World War.

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Book SynopsisWhen an essay is due and dreaded exams loom, this book offers students what they need to succeed. It provides chapter-by-chapter analysis, explanations of key themes, motifs and symbols, a review quiz, and essay topics. It is suitable for late-night studying and paper writing.

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell’s essay examines the power of language to shape political ideas. It is about the importance of writing concisely, clearly and precisely and the dangers to our ability to think when language, especially political language, is obscured by vague, clichéd phrases and hackneyed metaphors. In it, he argues that when political discourse trades clarity and precision for stock phrases, the debasement of politics follows. First published in Horizon in 1946, Orwell’s essay was soon recognised as an important text, circulated by newspaper editors to their journalists and reprinted in magazines and anthologies of contemporary writing. It continues to be relevant to our own age.

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Book SynopsisMoney is what God used to be. Good and evil have no meaning any longer except failure and success.Disgusted by society''s materialism, Gordon Comstock leaves his job in advertising to pursue an ill-fated career as a poet. In his race to the bottom, only Rosemary, his long-suffering girlfriend, challenges Gordon''s self-destructive course. The novel contains the most sustained reflections on the role of the author and the artistic imagination anywhere in Orwell''s fiction, as the book''s protagonist struggles (and ultimately fails) to reconcile his romantic-aestheticist sensibilities with the pressures of the literary marketplace and with social expectations. Completed while Orwell travelled north to work on The Road to Wigan Pier, this novel is a key transitional text in his career. Offering a powerful portrayal of the emotional toll of precarity and the desire to break with capitalism, Keep the Aspidistra Flying is a significant work of mid-century British fiction but it also speaks to our own time.ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Table of ContentsIntroduction Notes on the Text Select Bibliography A Chronology of George Orwell Keep the Aspidistra Flying Explanatory Notes

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell set out ‘to make political writing into an art’, and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature – his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell’s essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. Inside the Whale, the eighth in the Orwell’s Essays series, discusses Henry Miller’s controversial Tropic of Cancer, and considers the driving power behind the great books of the 1930s. Comparing Miller with other literary giants, Orwell lambasts the notion that all literature is good, forcing the reader to think for themselves, with his final words ringing in their ears: ‘five thousand novels are published in England every year and four thousand nine hundred of them are tripe.’

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Book SynopsisIn late 1927, at the age of twenty-four, George Orwell relocated to a tiny flat on London's Portobello Road, and from there embarked on a series of exploratory tramping expeditions to the city's East End, then a place of great squalor and deprivation. Later he moved to Paris's bohemian Latin Quarter, where, in early 1929, during a bout of serious illness, he was the victim of a robbery that left him in a state of near destitution, forcing him to work punishing hours in a series of menial jobs, including as a restaurant dishwasher. These real-life experiences laid the foundations for what would be the young writer's first full-length work.Populated by a troupe of colourful characters, replete with penetrating observations and cast in the limpid prose that would become Orwell's hallmark, Down and Out in Paris and London published by Victor Gollancz in 1933 provides both an invaluable historical snapshot and an insight into the perennial social evils of inequality, poverty an

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Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.We walk about under a load of memories which we long to share and somehow never can.John Flory, a white timber merchant in 1920s Burma, has unorthodox views. To him, the Burmese culture and people should be appreciated as things of beauty and worth. To the other white members of the European club of which he is member, these views are dangerous, undermining the foundation of British colonial rule.Flory is drawn into a deadly rivalry when he befriends Veraswami, an Indian doctor, who is under the scrutiny of a corrupt magistrate. Flory defies the convention of imperial bigotry in Burma by offering to help his new friend, but the consequences to him, and Elizabeth Lackersteen, the woman he loves, will be explosive.Based on his experiences as a policeman in Burma, Burmese Days was Orwell's first novel, and sparked controversy for its scathing portrayal of colonial society.

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Book SynopsisBased on his experiences as a policeman in Burma, George Orwell's first novel is set during the end days of British colonialism, when Burma is ruled from Delhi as part of British India.Table of ContentsIntroduction Note on the Text Select Bibliography Chronology Burmese Days Explanatory Notes

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell, perhaps one of the most perceptive writers of the twentieth century, wrote extensively about English life and politics. This selection of his essays and journalism brings together his most provocative and insightful writing on England and Englishness. Part of the Macmillan Collector’s Library; a series of stunning, clothbound, pocket-sized classics with gold foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. This edition is edited and introduced by Professor Michael Gardiner.Orwell’s interests were broad. He often wrote about everyday concerns such as transport, food and the weather. Turning to social issues, he exposed the plight of the poor and the unemployed. He dissected the idea of nationalism and he examined the failings of the Left. What emerges from his acute observation of English rituals, habits and attitudes is his belief that these are the very things with which the English people can defend themselves against oppression. His writing remains insightful and prescient to this day.Trade ReviewHis [Orwell’s] real talent was for analysing and explaining a tumultuous period in human history. -- Dorian Lynsky * Guardian *In my 20s, I discovered Orwell’s essays and nonfiction books and reread them so many times that my copies started to disintegrate. -- George Packer * The Atlantic *

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell was a novelist unlike any other, fiercely devoted to presenting the truth as he saw it. The three novels in this collection date from the 1930s, before his political satires Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four made him world-famous. Compelling works in their own right, they are all studies of men at odds with their surroundings. In Burmese Days, the darkest of the three, a frustrated expatriate finds himself trapped between the decadence of his own people and the corruption of the natives they claim to rule. Coming Up for Airdramatizes the frustration of every little man in his hopeless struggle against bourgeois respectability. Keep the Aspidistra Flying is a sort of comedy in which minor poet Gordon Comstock engages briefly with romantic dreams before realizing that salvation is to be found, not in escape from his life but engagement with it.

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Book SynopsisIn the Burmese provincial town of Kyauktada, the world-weary John Flory - a thirty-something English teak dealer - leads a life of quiet disillusionment, hardly mixing with the natives or the expat community, and deriving some comfort only from his conversations with an Indian friend, Doctor Veraswami, and the attentions of his local mistress. His prospects seem to improve when he meets the orphaned niece of a timber merchant, Elizabeth Lackersteen, who appears to reciprocate his feelings of love - but the arrival on the scene of another suitor, the boorish police officer Verrall, and the scheming of a disgruntled local magistrate threaten to shatter Flory's dreams and put him on a path to tragedy. Based on the author's own experiences in Burma as a young officer in the Indian Imperial Police, Burmese Days - here presented in the version published in Britain in 1944, which follows the text of its first American edition - is George Orwell's debut novel, invaluable both as a faithful description of life in Burma during the twilight of the British Raj and as an expose of the failings of colonial rule.

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Book SynopsisTwenty-eight-year-old Dorothy Hare leads a life of drudgery and self-abnegation in the house of her father, the rector of Knype Hill, helping him stave off his creditors and making costumes for fund-raising events. When, after being invited to dinner by Mr Warburton, a local atheist and libertine, she is glimpsed in his arms by the village gossip, Mrs Semprill, Dorothy suffers a breakdown and, struck by amnesia, embarks on journey that will see her join a group of vagrants, pick hops in the fields of Kent, stay in a hotel for “working girls” and sleep rough on the streets of London. Perhaps the most experimental among his writings, A Clergyman’s Daughter, first published in 1935, is Orwell’s second work of fiction – and one that, in its depiction of a protagonist who rebels against and is ultimately vanquished by the society that oppresses her, is a clear prefiguration of later novels such as Keep the Aspidistra Flying and Nineteen Eighty-Four.

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Book SynopsisA powerful and straightforward dramatisation of Orwell's enduring parable on the perils of totalitarianism. Ian Wooldridge's dramatisation of Animal Farm remains faithful to Orwell's original, retaining both its affection for the animals and the inciciveness of its message. It was first performed by TAG Theatre Company at the Citizens Theatre, Glasgow, in 1982. This edition contains production notes for schools and other groups wishing to stage the play.Trade Review'Dare I say it... as good as the book' * Guardian *

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Book SynopsisWith a new introduction by Professor Richard Bradford this edition takes a fresh look at one of the great works of the twentieth century. Orwell's classic dystopian fiction warns us of our future, and deals with issues that speak to multiple dangers faced by many nations today. Winston Smith is a member of 'the party' and subject to constant surveillance by the eyes of Big Brother, the ruler of the society. 'Newspeak' is designed to eradicate all political speech, 'Thoughtcrimes' are categorized as any thoughts of resistance or rebellion against any aspect of society, and the threat of despatch to 'Room 101' is a looming warning to all. Orwell explores the mechanics of totalitarianism revealing how control over the mass media allows the state to control all aspects of life, both the past and the future.

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell''s best-known novels, Animal Farm, describing a revolution that goes horribly wrong, and Nineteen Eighty-Four, portraying a world where human freedom has been crushed, are two of the most famous, well-quoted and influential political satires ever written. The other novels in this volume also tell stories of people at odds with repressive institutions: the corrupt imperialism of Burmese Days, disaffection with materialistic society in Keep the Aspidistra Flying, the perils of modern suburban living in Coming Up for Air and surviving on the streets in A Clergyman''s Daughter.All the novels brought together here display Orwell''s humour, his understanding of human nature and his great compassion.Trade Review'Orwell described the compromised lives we recognize as our own' - Andrew Motion, Observer 'A writer who can -- and must -- be rediscovered with every age' Irish Times

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Book SynopsisFirst published in 1949, George Orwell''s Nineteen Eighty-Four has lost none of the impact with which it first hit readers.Winston Smith works for the Ministry of Truth in London, chief city of Airstrip One. Big Brother stares out from every poster, the Thought Police uncover every act of betrayal. When Winston finds love with Julia, he discovers that life does not have to be dull and deadening, and awakens to new possibilities. Despite the police helicopters that hover and circle overhead, Winston and Julia begin to question the Party; they are drawn towards conspiracy. Yet Big Brother will not tolerate dissent - even in the mind. For those with original thoughts they invented Room 101. . .

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Book SynopsisA new edition of Orwell''s savage satire of the Soviet Revolution, introduced and annotated by his biographer, D.J. TaylorFirst published in 1945, just as the allied forces had begun to parcel up the post-war world, Orwell''s satire of the Soviet Revolution was instantly acclaimed as a Cold War classic. Set in the English countryside in the early years of the twentieth century, this is the story of a rebellion that fails, carried out by revolutionaries who all too swiftly turn into the thing they were trying to destroy.This new edition includes an introduction and extensive end-notes, and an appendix containing original responses to the novel as well as letters and documents from the period in which Animal Farm was written.

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Book SynopsisThis new edition of Orwell's 1933 text comes with an authoratative introduction, explanatory notes, and a select bibliography to help first-time readers situate the novel in it's contexts and offer a fresh new re-evaluation of the work to returning readers.

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