Orwell & Empire by Douglas Kerr*

Orwell & Empire Douglas Kerr Oxford University Press, 2022, pp 240 ISBN: 978 0 192 86409 3 Once there was a British writer, an Englishman who was born in India. He was privately educated in England, did not go to university, returned to the East after leaving school, and lived and worked there for a […]

Orwell in Burma: The Two Erics*

Eric Frank Seeley (1902-1972) and Eric Arthur Blair (1903-1950) first met at Eton College, then reconnected in Rangoon during the mid-1920s. This paper argues that a limited, problematic representation of Seeley and his ‘Indian lady’ in Orwell scholarship has resulted in significant contextual information being suppressed, overlooked or misunderstood. More detailed knowledge of Seeley’s life […]

Orwell’s Scottish Ancestry & Slavery*

This post has been updated. Read this one. “He hated Scotsmen!”    Kay Ekevall “He wrote under the name ‘Orwell’, partly because he preferred separate identity as an author, partly because he disliked he idea of family origins in Scotland.”  Anthony Powell   Slave Owner: Blair Come here! You ! Adam ! You’d better jump a […]