Imperialism: A Brief History Of George Orwell

History of George Orwell:

George Orwell adopted that name because of his patriotism towards England. George was the name of the king at the time and Orwell was the name a river, of his favorite countryside location. His legal name was Eric Arthur Blair and was born on June 25, 1903 in Motihari, a British providence at the time where his father worked. At the age of one he moved to England. After some time being there he managed to obtain enough scholarships to attend St. Cyprian. Thanks to his success at St. Cyprian, at the age of fourteen he managed to get a scholarship to attend Eton College. Although he was attending one of the most prestigious schools in the country he could not engage himself fully because of the liberal atmosphere at

After doing some time in Burma he got the opportunity to see what it was like to be in an imperialist society. He saw the impact it had on their society, chose to leave, and quit the Indian Imperial Police.

In 1927, after quitting the Indian Imperial Police he returned to England and stated that, “No modern man in his heart of hearts, believes that it is right to invade a foreign country and hold the population down by force.” That is when it was first made known to the public that he rejected the idea of imperialism and set out to be a poor writer. During the process he got to travel to various places, such as Paris. Then he eventually made his way back to England in 1929, where he still continued to write about the poor. In 1933, Orwell achieved his first publication Down and Out in Paris and London.

Even after publishing his first novel, he did not have a stable income, and in some occasions was homeless. So he decided to volunteer to fight for the Republicans during the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. He chose to fight for the Spanish government who was fighting against a German Nazi backed military coup. After serving for the Republicans he decided to join the Labor Party and the Workers Party of Marxist

The novel revolves around the theme totalitarianism, which is a government that seeks to control every aspect of one’s life. Such as when a government tells its citizens who they are allowed to talk to, what they are allowed to say, and who their friends are. In some extreme cases they are made to believe what the government wants them to believe.

The novel was written during the World War 2 era where there were two superpowers in the world that were run by totalitarian government, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. Orwell projected an image of how England, a free country, would be if it were to be under the control of a totalitarian government. He emphasizes the tragic place it would be by describing the city of London as a depressing place with no food or enough supplies to go around. He also describes how there is a war going on that no one completely know about and how there are always random rockets coming out of the sky killing innocent people. One of the things that he emphasizes the most is that the people do not even know who is truly running the government, all they know they know is that “big brother” is watching and he is a very dominant figure. In the novel there are several reasons why they government knows so much and why they can get away with so much that is because there are spies, cameras, and microphones