English novelist, essayist, journalist, and critic George Orwell was born on June 25, 1903. Christened Eric Arthur Blair, his birthplace is at Motihari, Bihar where his father was working as an Opium Agent in the Indian Civil Service. Orwell’s first book, Down and Out in Paris and London, a fictional memoir about a British writer grappling with poverty in the two cities, was published in 1933. The defining political experience of his life was the time he spent in Spain in 1937 as a Republican volunteer against the dictator Franco. Orwell was shot at there and he suffered a serious injury. He was in Barcelona when Soviet-sponsored hit-squads targeted the Trotskyist POUM militia, of which he had been a member. His stint in Spain made Orwell ‘‘believe in Socialism for the first time’’ and inculcated a lifelong hatred of totalitarian systems in him. Homage to Catalonia, an account of his time in Spain, was published in April 1938.
Animal Farm, Orwell’s memorable satire about the Soviet experiment, was written in 1944. After finishing work on it, it took him a year to find a publisher who would dare to take it on and it was out in print in 1945. His final novel, Nineteen Eighty-Four, became a resounding international success on its publication in June 1949. One of the most insightful works about the dangers of totalitarian rule, it remains a classic of world literature. This dystopian novel, both a cautionary tale and a chilling prophecy about the future, is more timely than ever today when authoritarian regimes across the world are gaining power.
