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.

Orwell draws on his experience in the Indian Imperial Police for his first novel, BURMESE DAYS, a devastating indictment of British colonial rule (he resigned 'to escape not merely from imperialism but from every form of man's dominion over man', as he later wrote). John Flory, cowardly and self-pitying, makes an unlikely but all-too-human tragic hero as he defies convention and prejudice to befriend an Indian doctor, then shoots himself when the girl who had seemed to promise escape from the stultifying 'lie' of colonial life refuses to marry him. While reporting on the dark side of the Raj, Orwell nonetheless came under the spell of the landscape of the East, and the exotic background of BURMESE DAYS inspired his most lush descriptive writing. ...Back in England, Orwell tackles capitalism, nonconformity and compromise in KEEP THE ASPIDISTRA FLYING. Youthful idealist and would-be author Gordon Comstock rebels against a life of middle-class respectability (symbolized by the aspidistra), abandoning his job with an advertising company to work part-time in a bookshop. But everything goes wrong: alternately proud and self-loathing, he lets himself sink into poverty; he is unable to write; he gets his long-suffering girlfriend pregnant. At the end, respectably married - and with an aspidistra of his own -he is back at his old firm writing copy for deodorant ads. Grimly comic - and again, written from Orwell's own experience, this time of living in the London slums - KEEP THE ASPIDISTRA FLYING is a still-relevant commentary on society's subservience to 'the Money God' and an affirmation of the power of human relationships to survive in spite of it.In COMING UP FOR AIR, George Bowling, married, mortgaged and middle aged, deals with his mid-life crisis by forsaking dull suburbia for a rural idyll. But the fondly remembered village of his childhood has been transformed by the very 'Progress' he seeks to escape: the estate where he used to fish has been built over; the pond turned into a rubbish dump. An old girlfriend fails to recognize him, and she herself is shockingly ravaged by time. Written in 1938-9, COMING UP FOR AIR is permeated with nostalgia for the England of a more tranquil age - before industrialization and capitalism had done their worst - and overshadowed by premonitions of what is to come - 'the war and the after-war, Hitler, Stalin, bombs, machine-guns, food-queues, rubber truncheons'. Above all, it unsparingly confronts the failure of youthful dreams and the impossibility of ever reclaiming the past.

A brilliant political travelogue that uses Burma to explain Orwell and Orwell to explain what life is really like under the authoritarian rule of the Burmese generals.

George Orwell's 'Big Brother' is alive and well in Burma; to many Burmese, Orwell is known as 'The Prophet'. In this book, Emmar Larkin journeys into the Orwellian land created by Burma's ruling generals, and presents a side to the country that the military government does not want revealed.

Burmese Days is George Orwell's first novel, originally published in 1934. Set in British Burma during the waning days of the British empire, when Burma was ruled from Delhi as part of British India, the novel serves as a portrait of the dark side of the British Raj. At the center of the novel is John Flory, trapped within a bigger system that is undermining the better side of human nature. The novel deals with indigenous corruption and imperial bigotry in a society where natives peoples were viewed as interesting, but ultimately inferior. Includes a bibliography and brief bio of the author.

"From the author of Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea and Shenzhen: A Travelogue from China, is Burma Chronicles, an informative look at a country that uses concealment and isolation as social control. It is drawn with Guy Delisle's minimal line while interspersed with wordless vignettes and moments of his distinctive slapstick humor. Burma Chronicles has been translated from the French by Helge Dascher. Dascher has been translating graphic novels from French and German to English for over twenty years. A contributor to Drawn & Quarterly since the early days, her translations include acclaimed titles such as the Aya series by Marguerite Abouet and Clément Oubrerie, Hostage by Guy Delisle, and Beautiful Darkness by Fabien Vehlmann and Kerascoët. With a background in art history and history, she also translates books and exhibitions for museums in North America and Europe. She lives in Montreal."

Based 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.

In February 1942, Singapore fell to the Japanese and Denys Peek was among the tens of thousands of British and Commonwealth soldiers and citizens taken prisoner. Eight months later, he and countless other PoWs were packed into steel goods wagons and transported by rail to Slam - their destination the massive construction project that would become infamous as the Burma Thailand Railway. He would spend the next three years in over 15 different work and 'hospital' camps on the railway, stubbornly refusing to give up in a place where over 20,000 prisoners of war (an innumerable slave labourers) met their deaths. Written with clarity, passion and a remarkable eye for detail, Denys Peek's memoir recalls not just the hardships and horrors of the railway, the daily struggle for survival, but also the comradeship, spirit and humour of the men who worked on it. It stands as a haunting, evocative and deeply moving testimony to the suffering of those who lived and died there - a salutary reminder of man's potential for inhumanity to his fellow man.

Unlock the more straightforward side of Burmese Days with this concise and insightful summary and analysis! This engaging summary presents an analysis of Burmese Days by George Orwell, which is based on the writer’s own experiences as a member of the British Indian Imperial Police in the 1920s. It depicts a brutally divided society, in which racism is endemic and the natives are widely seen as inherently inferior to the white European colonisers. In this atmosphere, corruption and scheming flourish, leaving the novel’s protagonist, the timber merchant John Flory, deeply disillusioned and alienated. Burmese Days is Orwell’s earliest novel. Along with his influential later works, including 1984 and Animal Farm, it reflects an enduring preoccupation with social justice and the oppression of the powerless by world governments. Find out everything you need to know about Burmese Days in a fraction of the time! This in-depth and informative reading guide brings you: • A complete plot summary • Character studies • Key themes and symbols • Questions for further reflection Why choose BrightSummaries.com? Available in print and digital format, our publications are designed to accompany you on your reading journey. The clear and concise style makes for easy understanding, providing the perfect opportunity to improve your literary knowledge in no time. See the very best of literature in a whole new light with BrightSummaries.com!