Orwell, George Books - Page 3

Finding George Orwell in Burma

Emma Larkin

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 34 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

In one of the most intrepid travelogues in recent memory, Emma Larkin tells of the year she spent traveling through Burma, using as a compass the life and work of George Orwell, whom many of Burma’s underground teahouse intellectuals call simply “the Prophet.” In stirring prose, she provides a powerful reckoning with one of the world’s least free countries. Finding George Orwell in Burma is a brave and revelatory reconnaissance of modern Burma, one of the world’s grimmest and most shuttered police states, where the term “Orwellian” aptly describes the life endured by the country’s people. BACKCOVER: “A truer picture of authoritarianism than anyone has written since, perhaps, Orwell himself.”
—Mother Jones

“Mournful, meditative, appealingly idiosyncratic . . . an exercise in literary detection but also a political travelogue.”
—The New York Times

“Combining literary criticism with solid field reporting, [Larkin] captures the country at its best and, more often, its worst.”
—San Francisco Chronicle

“[A] sobering, journalistic memoir . . . A disquieting profile of a country and its people.”
—Newsweek

Keep the Aspidistra Flying

George Orwell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 47 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

You can get anything in this world if you genuinely don't want it 5 out of 5 stars.
8 of 9 people found this review helpful.

After recently reading the 4 volume set of the essays, plus Coming Up for Air, which I found in my shelf unread, I had thought that the Aspidistra would be the closing session on Orwell for me. I thought I had covered the field. Unfortunately and surprisingly, the aspidistra are so fresh and enjoyable, despite their sordid subject, that I find myself under compulsive pressure to order the books that I have not read yet (the Clergyman's Daughter, the Road to Wigan Pier, Down and Out in Paris and London).
As much as I like to look at plants, assuming they grow wild or they are cultivated by somebody else, I am no gardener nor botanist. I honestly did not know what an aspidistra is. I looked it up in the Langenscheid's Dictionary English - German. I learned that an aspidistra is an Aspidistra. Aha. Google Images teach me that the thing is a somewhat non-descript and somewhat unkempt pot plant. It seems to like growing in places that no self-respecting plant ought to survive. Orwell's novel has them as a symbol for undestructability under nasty circumstances.
For the novel's hero Gordon Comstock, they are the enemy. They are allied with the oppressors, the seedy boarding houses and lower middle class dwellings that he loathes so much. They symbolize the lack of money; money rules, specifically when you don't have any.
The twist of the 'plot' is that Gordon chose to be poorer than he needed to be, by throwing away 'good jobs' in the money making world. We have here a study in the pretensions of poverty.
The most brillant parts of this amazing novel have us watch confrontations, or should I say Pas-de-Deux, of different social strata. Gordon tries to hide and is ashamed of his poverty, while his friend Ravelston is trying to hide and is ashamed of his wealth. The rich man is the socialist, who tries and tries to convince the poor man of the merits of socialism. Gordon can't be bothered, he doesn't have enough money to be a socialist.
The novel is far exceeding my expectations and I may have to think again about my classification of Orwell as mainly an essayist.

Editorial Review:

Gordon Comstock loathes dull, middle-class respectability and worship of money. He gives up a 'good job' in advertising to work part-time in a bookshop, giving him more time to write. But he slides instead into a self-induced poverty that destroys his creativity and his spirit. Only Rosemary, ever-faithful Rosemary, has the strength to challenge his commitment to his chosen way of life. Through the character of Gordon Comstock, Orwell reveals his own disaffection with the society he once himself renounced.

Coming Up for Air

George Orwell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 21 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Semi-detached suburban Fatty Bowling 5 out of 5 stars.
12 of 13 people found this review helpful.

Oddly, the pocket book cover quotes the NYT that this book is a 'charming ... minor masterpiece'. It took me a while to realize that this is exactly the case.
The novel is set in London in 1938, with WW2 looming. It was Orwell's first novel after risking his life in Catalonia. It was his last novel before Animal Farm. He still had ambitions to play in James Joyce's league as a novelist. He greatly admired Ulysses. In a way, his George Fatty Bowling is Orwell's Leo Bloom in London. But not quite. As charming as the novel is, it is also the final proof that Orwell was not the great novelist that he would have wished to be. He was a great essayist. Even his two later masterpieces, Animal Farm and 1984, essentially demonstrate that he was in first place an essayist and a man with a message.
Coming up for Air is the monologue of a middle aged middle class man who takes a break from his oppressive family and job life. He is the antisocial character who paints his front door green, where all others are blue. He escapes for an outing and 'comes up for air'.
The story is told by the hero in an odd mixture of stream of consciousness and autobiography. One might say, Orwell told parts of his own life story. And that is the crux of the matter: he remains the intellectual who sympathizes with the proles and despises the upward ambitions of the lower middle classes.
The book is a failure insofar as Orwell never manages to let Bowling speak. Bowling is just a pretext for Orwell's own words.
The book is not a failure, because what Orwell has to tell us of England between 1893 and 1938 is well worth knowing. Bowling should be an uninteresting man, by all criteria, but Orwell fails to let him bore us.

Editorial Review:

This compelling story of a middle-aged man's journey back to the longgone village of his youth is told with humor, warmth and nostalgia which will surprise and delight Orwell's large audience. 6 cassettes.

George Orwell Boxed Set (1984 and Animal Farm)

George Orwell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Great readers 5 out of 5 stars.
3 of 3 people found this review helpful.

Simon Prebble and Ralph Cosham both do a fine job of narration. They both have easily understood English accents, and differentiated character voices that are not distracting and allow the listener to easily follow dialog between multiple characters.

Both books are very good cautionary tales about over-mighty governments that remain unchecked by citizens. I am a naturally optimistic person, but after I read either one of these books I am forced to take a more warily critical look at the government and media. It is very important that all citizens do this occasionally to avoid becoming the sheep of Animal Farm or the blind party member of 1984.

Editorial Review:

1984

Orwell depicts a gray, totalitarian world in which privacy does not exist, news is manufactured according to the authorities' will, and those with unorthodox ideas are brainwashed or put to death. Orwell's 1949 nightmare vision of the world we were becoming is still the great modern classic of negative Utopia.

Animal Farm

In this satire of the Russian Revolution, Manor Farm is transformed into Animal Farm, a democracy proclaiming, "All Animals Are Created Equal." But through the natures of the various animals, totalitarian rule is eventually resumed under the slogan, "But Some Animals Are More Equal than Others."

My Country Right or Left 1940-1943: The Collected Essays Journalism & Letters of George Orwell (Collected Essays Journalism and Letters of George Orwell)

Sonia Orwell, George Orwell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Considering that much of his life was spent in poverty and ill health, it is something of a miracle that in only forty-six years George Orwell managed to publish ten books and two collections of essays. Here, in four fat volumes, is the best selection of his non-fiction available, a trove of letters, essays, reviews, and journalism that is breathtaking in its scope and eclectic passions. Orwell had something to say about just about everyone and everything. His letters to such luminaries as Julian Symons, Anthony Powell, Arthur Koestler, and Cyril Connolly are poignant and personal. His essays, covering everything from "English Cooking" to "Literature and Totalitarianism," are memorable, and his books reviews (Hitler's Mein Kampf, Mumford's Herman Melville, Miller's Black Spring, Goldsmith's The Vicar of Wakefield to name just a few) are among the most lucid and intelligent ever written. From 1943 to l945, he wrote a regular column for the Tribune, a left wing weekly, entitled "As I Please." His observations about life in Britain during the war embraced everything from anti-American sentiment to the history of domestic appliances.

George Orwell: As I Please, 1943-1945 : The Collected Essays, Journalism & Letters (Collected Essays Journalism and Letters of George Orwell) (Collected Essays Journalism and Letters of George Orwell)

George Orwell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 11 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Considering that much of his life was spent in poverty and ill health, it is something of a miracle that in only forty-six years George Orwell managed to publish ten books and two collections of essays. Here, in four fat volumes, is the best selection of his non-fiction available, a trove of letters, essays, reviews, and journalism that is breathtaking in its scope and eclectic passions. Orwell had something to say about just about everyone and everything. His letters to such luminaries as Julian Symons, Anthony Powell, Arthur Koestler, and Cyril Connolly are poignant and personal. His essays, covering everything from "English Cooking" to "Literature and Totalitarianism," are memorable, and his books reviews (Hitler's Mein Kampf, Mumford's Herman Melville, Miller's Black Spring, Goldsmith's The Vicar of Wakefield to name just a few) are among the most lucid and intelligent ever written. From 1943 to l945, he wrote a regular column for the Tribune, a left wing weekly, entitled "As I Please." His observations about life in Britain during the war embraced everything from anti-American sentiment to the history of domestic appliances.

1984: New Classic Edition

George Orwell

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Editorial Review:

Orwell depicts a gray, totalitarian world in which privacy does not exist, news is manufactured according to the authorities' will, and those with unorthodox ideas are brainwashed or put to death. Orwell's 1949 nightmare vision of the world we were becoming is still the great modern classic of negative Utopia.

George Orwell: An Age Like This 1920-1940: The Collected Essays, Journalism & Letters (Collected Essays Journalism and Letters of George Orwell)

George Orwell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Considering that much of his life was spent in poverty and ill health, it is something of a miracle that in only forty-six years George Orwell managed to publish ten books and two collections of essays. Here, in four fat volumes, is the best selection of his non-fiction available, a trove of letters, essays, reviews, and journalism that is breathtaking in its scope and eclectic passions. Orwell had something to say about just about everyone and everything. His letters to such luminaries as Julian Symons, Anthony Powell, Arthur Koestler, and Cyril Connolly are poignant and personal. His essays, covering everything from "English Cooking" to "Literature and Totalitarianism," are memorable, and his books reviews (Hitler's Mein Kampf, Mumford's Herman Melville, Miller's Black Spring, Goldsmith's The Vicar of Wakefield to name just a few) are among the most lucid and intelligent ever written. From 1943 to l945, he wrote a regular column for the Tribune, a left wing weekly, entitled "As I Please." His observations about life in Britain during the war embraced everything from anti-American sentiment to the history of domestic appliances.

Rebelion En La Granja / Animal Farm (Novela (Booket Numbered))

George Orwell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Por alguna razón este libro sigue siendo proibido 5 out of 5 stars.
4 of 10 people found this review helpful.

Uno de los libros mas poderosos en la historia del mundo. Se trata de una granja donde los animales se revelan contra el granjero. Este libro ha sido proibido en los Estados Unidos, y sigue siendo proibido en partes de America Latina.

Despues de leer este libro, te acostaras en la esquinita de tu habitación en posición fetal mamandote el dedo y canturreando "El Ratoncito Miguel."

Si, soy un enfermo.

Excelente obra sobre que ilustra la Revolucion Rusa 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful.

El Sr. Jones no sabe lo que estaba a punto de ocurrir en su granja pero continuaba con su patron de explotacion hasta el dia en que los animales se levantaron para hacer justicia y buscar la igualdad. La trama gira en torno a la manera en la que los animales producen y llevan a cabo esta revolucion. Este es un clasico el cual estuvo prohibido y censurado en muchos lugares. Hoy podemos disfrutar de esta excelente obra de George Orwell. En esta edicion encontrara un prologo nunca antes publicado escrito por el autor, el cual es analizado en su contexto. Excelente obra facil de leer, entretenida y con un potencial historico extraordinario.

Editorial Review:

Esta es una fabula en la que la adjudicacion de las aflicciones y las necesidades humanas a los animales protagonistas vencio la resistencia nacional de los primeros lectores a mirar lo que no querian mirar. Lo que nos cuenta el autor ya estaba en los periodicos: la historia sobre los crimenes estalinistas en la Union Sovietica.

In Front of Your Nose, 1945-1950 (Collected Essays Journalism and Letters of George Orwell)

George Orwell

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Considering that much of his life was spent in poverty and ill health, it is something of a miracle that in only forty-six years George Orwell managed to publish ten books and two collections of essays. Here, in four fat volumes, is the best selection of his non-fiction available, a trove of letters, essays, reviews, and journalism that is breathtaking in its scope and eclectic passions. Orwell had something to say about just about everyone and everything. His letters to such luminaries as Julian Symons, Anthony Powell, Arthur Koestler, and Cyril Connolly are poignant and personal. His essays, covering everything from "English Cooking" to "Literature and Totalitarianism," are memorable, and his books reviews (Hitler's Mein Kampf, Mumford's Herman Melville, Miller's Black Spring, Goldsmith's The Vicar of Wakefield to name just a few) are among the most lucid and intelligent ever written. From 1943 to l945, he wrote a regular column for the Tribune, a left wing weekly, entitled "As I Please." His observations about life in Britain during the war embraced everything from anti-American sentiment to the history of domestic appliances.