George Orwell

Eric Arthur Blair

University College Hospital, London

1906–21, 1927–36, 1937–50

George Orwell was born Eric Arthur Blair in Motihari, Bihar to Richard Walmsley Blair, an official in the Opium Department of the Indian Civil Service, and Ida Mabel Limouzin. His mother moved with her children to England and settled in Henley-on-Thames in 1904. Orwell was educated at St Cyprian’s School and Eton, where he was briefly taught French by Aldous Huxley.

Instead of opting to study at Cambridge or Oxford, which would have been a logical step for an Eton-educated man, Orwell applied for a colonial job in Burma, where a large number of his mother’s family, including his grandmother, still lived. He joined the Indian Imperial Police Force in 1922. As part of his training he learnt Burmese and Hindustani. Orwell resigned his position after five years and returned to England to become a full-time writer. He drew on his experiences of imperialism for Burmese Days, ‘A Hanging’ and ‘Shooting an Elephant’, which unmasks how much he loathed the colonial administrative system of which he had become a part. Victor Gollancz turned down Burmese Days for fear of libel action and it was published in the US in 1934.

After his return, Orwell started to build his reputation as a left-wing writer. He was well known for his social reportage in books like Down and Out in Paris and London (1933) or Homage to Catalonia (1938), based on his experiences during the Spanish Civil War. From the early 1930s Orwell reviewed and wrote poems and sketches for the journal Adelphi.

Orwell’s network of Indian friends expanded when he joined the BBC Indian Section of the Eastern Service as Talks Assistant in 1941. Orwell was deemed a suitable candidate because of his Indian experience, his service in Burma, his frank honesty and his proficiency in Burmese and Hindustani. Orwell had already broadcast on the BBC Home Service. After Z. A. Bokhari had produced a number of talks by Orwell for the Eastern Service, he recommended him for a full position with the Indian section, which Orwell took up on 16 August 1941. He attended training courses together with William Empson, who had also just started working for the BBC in London. Orwell worked as part of the BBC’s efforts to counter the German propaganda machine and to communicate to India the importance of its support for Britain in the war effort. Orwell was instrumental in arranging a diverse schedule of programmes on arts, culture and politics, such as the literary magazine programme Voice, which brought together a wide range of South Asian, British and Caribbean writers. It would provide the template for Una Marson’s Caribbean Voices. Orwell and Mulk Raj Anand became good friends while working at the BBC. Anand would cook Indian meals for Orwell. Both had shared similar experiences while fighting with Republicans during the Spanish Civil War. Orwell commissioned Anand to write a talk on the event; however, it did not pass the censor. He also befriended the Eurasian writer Cedric Dover, commissioning him to write talks for the Indian section, recommending him to publishers and editors and supporting him for a grant at the Royal Literary Fund.

Orwell became increasingly frustrated with the threat of censorship and questioned the effectiveness of the Service’s broadcasts. He also resented being challenged by Bokhari for his published journalism in newspapers such as the Observer and New Statesman. He resigned his position in September 1943. After leaving the BBC, Orwell began work on his most famous works, Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949). His time at the BBC provided rich material for the latter novel. He continued to publish journalism and became the literary editor of Tribune. Orwell died of tuberculosis in 1950.