Diaries by George Orwell (EPUB)

Description

A major literary event—the long-awaited publication of George Orwell’s diaries, chronicling the events that inspired his greatest works.This groundbreaking volume, never before published in the United States, at last introduces the interior life of George Orwell, the writer who defined twentieth-century political thought. Written as individual books throughout his career, the eleven surviving diaries collected here record Orwell’s youthful travels among miners and itinerant laborers, the fearsome rise of totalitarianism, the horrific drama of World War II, and the feverish composition of his great masterpieces Animal Farm and 1984 (which have now sold more copies than any two books by any other twentieth-century author). Personal entries cover the tragic death of his first wife and Orwell’s own decline as he battled tuberculosis. Exhibiting great brilliance of prose and composition, these treasured dispatches, edited by the world’s leading Orwell scholar, exhibit “the seeds of famous passages to come” (New Statesman) and amount to a volume as penetrating as the autobiography he would never write.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I’m a huge George Orwell fan. Down and Out in Paris and London and 1984 are two entirely different but amazing works for art, and you’ll find a little of both in his diaries.The book begins with a fine introduction by the late Christopher Hitchens: “By declining to lie, even as far as possible to himself, and by his determination to seek elusive but verifiable truth, he showed how much can be accomplished by an individual who unites the qualities of intellectual honesty and moral courage.”You’ll find some of the most perceptive examinations on poverty in 1930s England as Orwell goes undercover as a day laborer working in the fields and orchards picking hops and fruit. His writing talent is well served by his acute observation as well as an open nonjudgemental attitude toward everyone and everything he comes across.“As to our living accommodation, the best quarters on the farm, ironically enough, were disused stables. Most of us sleep in round tin huts about 10 feed across, with no glass in the windows and all kinds of holes to let in the wind and rain.”His love for animals, nature and farming is abundantly noted in his journals. There are large sections musing on daily gardening, hens laying eggs, goat’s milk…. One of his goat’s is named Muriel, just like in Animal Farm. He loved to fish. He also gives us a daily weather report. This can be a bit tedious, but it gives us a excellent sense of a man rooted in real things such as the earth or, e.g., the impact of a storm.The Morocco diaries capture the flavor, politics, animals, and people at that time.“…there is an obvious great difference in the water supply between peasant’s plots and the plantations of Europeans and wealthy Arabs. The difficulty of water makes an immense amount of work.”My favorite section was his World War II diaries; they show Orwell the patriot and political activist. He is eager to help in any way he can, and he served in the Home Guard and eventually as a BBC propaganda correspondent in England’s efforts in India.He shows the psychological effects of constant air raids as well as the physical damage in or around London. And the resilience of the English who go about their daily routine despite the bombardments. These are the early days of the war, and we see the confusion and fluid nature of attitudes and the concern that England would be overrun and could possibly lose the war. He saw through all hypocrites, particularly the rich or “patriots.”“[I]t struck me how easy it is to bamboozle an uneducated audience if you have prepared beforehand a set of repartees with which to evade awkward questions.”He criticized and praised Churchill and called other politicians imbeciles and explained why their current strategy would likely lose the war. “C said he thought Churchhill, though a good man up to a point, was incapable of doing the necessary thing and turning this into a revolutionary war, and for that reason shielded Chamberlain and Co.”Like his novels and essays, his diaries would have fit nicely into current American polltics in 2013. Here is a comment he made about the upper classes: “Apparently nothing will ever teach these people that the other 99 percent of the population exist.”It is disappointing that we do not find much on his personal relations to anyone close to him, or little about his literary life.He is brave until the end, but it is painful to know he is near death while finishing 1984 at the young age of forty-six. A voice like his does not come along very often. This is an important piece of the Orwell oeuvre.

⭐There has been a great deal of literary hoopla around the recent publichation of the diaries of George Orwell on both sides of the pond. Deservedly so! Orwell (real name was Eric Arthur Blair) is a modern prophet. His targets are:a. The rule of totalitarianism-eg.. “Animal Farm” is a classic fable of life in a communist society.b. The destructive power of propaganda as a tool in the arsenal of governments who wish to retain power and control over society.c. A hatred of the stultified British class system.d. Orwell believed in speaking truth to power. His is a strong voice for democracy and freedom being exercised by the individual. Orwell was born in India in 19-3 but grew up in Great Britain. He came from the upper middle class world of Eton where he matriculated. Blair served in the Burmese and Indian Civil Service where he saw British colonialism close up. He later became a journalist and a member of the Communist Party. Orwell was wounded while fighting in the Spanish Civil War. During World War II he served in the Home Guard and broadcast to Asia on the BBC. He wrote many books and countless articles. He died at 47 from T.B. Since his death his books have become popular nd his is now a famous literary name. The eleven diaries contained in this volume run from 1931 until near the author’s death. They cover such topics as:a. His time picking hops along with tramps in Great Depression era England.b. His journalistic reports on coal miners and their lives in the West and North of England.c. The most interesting diary deals with World War II. Orwell was a eyewitness to the London bombing and worked in the BBC offices in London. He comments on the political and military scene with clarity and insight.d. Many of the diaries deal with Orwell’s life on his Wallington farm. We learn about barnyard animals; how many eggs were laid by the hens; wildlife in the region and the growth of garden vegetables and flowers. Orwell was a countryman by nature who loved to hunt, fish and spend time in the outdoors. Orwell is know best of “Animal Farm” and “1984” but his expose of mining life “The Road t Wigan Pier”; his experience in the Spanish Civil War “Homage to Catalonia” and many of his lesser novels and essays are well worth reading. The book is introduced by the late Christopher Hitchens an notable biographer of Orwel and edited by Peter Davison. Davison has edited the twenty volume Complete Works of th author. While I gave the book five stars many of its pages are somewhat dull unless you enjoy the minutia of farm life. This book is a literary event which deserves to be celebrated!

⭐This is a volume for those already drawn to Orwell and reasonably familiar with his work. Its entries are mostly mundane, and it is doubtful that one learns much that is wholly new about the author as artist of the written word, political thinker, or philosopher of language. Still, for those who revere or are otherwise intrigued by Orwell, it certainly is worth reading. The diary material is nicely edited, and clearly presented — at least as can be judged by an enthusiast who is not a scholar. If there are no intimate disclosures or startling comments, the reader is rewarded with a more textured context for the man in the exercise of living, and particularly for his plain sense of connection with simple nature, whether in his garden or wild. If there is anything surprising in the diaries, it is perhaps how important this connection was for Orwell. Also, the reader is enabled to better appreciate the fundamental integrity, or at least serious self-honesty, Orwell practiced in daily life; something familiar in his literary striving and admonitions, but evidently a practiced habit, as well. One can only wish that the diaries from the Spanish war had not vanished into Soviet archives or disposal.

⭐I know that many consider the research and scholarship by Peter Davison that has resulted in the huge multi-volume Orwell Collected Works, the Life in Letters, and this one-volume edition of the Diaries, to be amongst the most important contribution to Orwell studies in decades. This is almost certainly true.But what a disappointment this particular title is. It is drably presented. The print is small and grey and cramped and the layout overall — a cramped grey line between entries, footnotes in small print often in mid-page (as close to the relevant entry as possible, true enough) — is not conducive to reading for pleasure. Indeed, unlike the old four-volume Penguin set of The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell I don’t really think that this one-volume edition is designed with reading pleasure in mind.Even the jacket picture of Orwell seems badly chosen. When there are so many wonderful pictures of Orwell available, why choose a poorly exposed view of the man seen from behind — other than that it does admittedly show him writing. It is grey and poorly printed.I love the Penguin Modern Classics series and have titles from the past fifty years or so from many of the different variants this series has adopted. This is one of the poorest productions in the series that I have ever seen.

⭐If you are a George Orwell fan and like to read everything he’s ever written about life, the universe and everything in between, then you will enjoy this book. It is one of his lesser known and isn’t fictional – as the title suggests – it’s a diary.Some people enjoy reading others’ diaries and some don’t – they aren’t everyone’s cup of tea and some are more interesting than others. This isn’t the most interesting of his personal experiences and accounts but Orwell was a very intriguing person who had the wonderful talent of making even the most ordinary of events/experiences come alive on the page.You might read this for the sheer pleasure of Orwell’s writing talents – much like one might listen to a favourite piece of music – which is the best way, in my opinion (and it is just my opinion) to consider it.

⭐Of huge importance to any Orwell enthusiast. There are details here which may not be found elsewhere.

⭐a good mind at work,a pleasure to read

⭐superb

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