Facing Unpleasant Facts: Narrative EssaysEssays by the author of 1984 on topics from “remembrances of working in a bookshop [to] recollections of fighting in the Spanish Civil War” (Publishers Weekly). George Orwell was first and foremost an essayist, producing throughout his life an extraordinary array of short nonfiction that reflected—and illuminated—the fraught times in which he lived. “As soon as he began to write something,” comments George Packer in his foreword, “it was as natural for Orwell to propose, generalize, qualify, argue, judge—in short, to think—as it was for Yeats to versify or Dickens to invent.” Facing Unpleasant Facts charts Orwell’s development as a master of the narrative-essay form and unites such classics as “Shooting an Elephant” with lesser-known journalism and passages from his wartime diary. Whether detailing the horrors of Orwell’s boyhood in an English boarding school or bringing to life the sights, sounds, and smells of the Spanish Civil War, these essays weave together the personal and the political in an unmistakable style that is at once plainspoken and brilliantly complex. “Best known for his late-career classics Animal Farm and 1984, George Orwell—who used his given name, Eric Blair, in the earliest pieces of this collection aimed at the aficionado as well as the general reader—was above all a polemicist of the first rank. Organized chronologically, from 1931 through the late 1940s, these in-your-face writings showcase the power of this literary form.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review |
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Page 33
... rifle in my hands I was momentarily worth watching. And suddenly I realized that I should have to shoot the elephant after all. The people expected it of me and I had got to do it; I could feel their two thousand wills pressing me ...
... rifle in my hands I was momentarily worth watching. And suddenly I realized that I should have to shoot the elephant after all. The people expected it of me and I had got to do it; I could feel their two thousand wills pressing me ...
Page 34
... rifle. A sahib has got to act like a sahib; he has got to appear resolute, to know his own mind and do definite things. To come all that way, rifle in hand, with two thousand people marching at my heels, and then to trail feebly away ...
... rifle. A sahib has got to act like a sahib; he has got to appear resolute, to know his own mind and do definite things. To come all that way, rifle in hand, with two thousand people marching at my heels, and then to trail feebly away ...
Page 35
... rifle and the ground was soft mud into which one would sink at every step. If the elephant charged and I missed him, I should have about as much chance as a toad under a steam-roller. But even then I was not thinking particularly of my ...
... rifle and the ground was soft mud into which one would sink at every step. If the elephant charged and I missed him, I should have about as much chance as a toad under a steam-roller. But even then I was not thinking particularly of my ...
Page 37
... rifle and poured shot after shot into his heart and down his throat. They seemed to make no impression. The tortured gasps continued as steadily as the ticking of a clock. In the end I could not stand it any longer and went away. I ...
... rifle and poured shot after shot into his heart and down his throat. They seemed to make no impression. The tortured gasps continued as steadily as the ticking of a clock. In the end I could not stand it any longer and went away. I ...
Page 55
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Contents
1 | |
11 | |
23 | |
29 | |
38 | |
Marrakech | 44 |
My Country Right or Left | 52 |
War time Diary | 59 |
Revenge Is Sour | 184 |
The Case for the Open Fire | 189 |
The Sporting Spirit | 193 |
In Defence of English Cooking | 198 |
A Nice Cup of Tea | 201 |
The Moon Under Water | 205 |
In Front of Your Nose | 209 |
Some Thoughts on the Common Toad | 214 |
England Your England | 109 |
Dear Doktor Goebbels Your British Friends are Feeding Fine | 139 |
Looking Back on the Spanish War | 143 |
As I Please 1 | 167 |
As I Please 2 | 172 |
As I Please 3 | 175 |
As I Please 16 | 180 |
A Good Word for the Vicar of Bray | 219 |
Why I Write | 224 |
How the Poor Die | 232 |
Such Such Were the Joys | 245 |
Notes | 296 |
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actually American army believe bombs bread Britain British Burmese Days cell child Cyprian’s Cyril Connolly Daily Worker doubt early elephant England English essays eyes face fact Fascist feeling fight fire Flip France Fredric Warburg French German hand happened Hitler Homage to Catalonia Home Guard intelligentsia Italian Jews killed kind knew labour later less live London look man’s memory merely Moon Under Water morning Nazis never newspaper night one’s Orwell Orwell’s papers party patriotism perhaps Pétain political prison probably raids remember rifle round Russian Sambo seemed shoot Shooting an Elephant shot side simply soldiers sort Spain Spanish Spanish civil war spike stories talk thing thought tion took Tramp Major turned Vicar of Bray whole words writing