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D. J. Taylor
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Orwell: The Life Kindle Edition

by D. J. Taylor (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.3 4.3 out of 5 stars 70 ratings
See all formats and editions
Winner of the Whitbread Biography Award: A “profoundly moving [and] definitive” portrait of George Orwell, author of 1984 and larger-than-life literary genius (The Daily Telegraph).

It was not easy to bury George Orwell. After a lifetime of iconoclasm, during which he professed no interest in religion and no affiliation with any church, he asked to be buried in an Anglican churchyard—but none would have him. Orwell’s friends fought for him to have a proper grave, however, and the author of 1984, Animal Farm, and Homage to Catalonia, among other brilliant works of prose, poetry, and journalism, was laid to rest in a quiet country cemetery. Almost immediately, his legacy was in dispute.
 
Orwell did not want any biographies written of him, but that has not stopped scholars from trying. Of all those published since the author’s death in 1950, D. J. Taylor’s prize-winning book is considered the most definitive. Born in India, Orwell spent his forty-six years of life traveling the British Empire and confronting the world head on. From the trenches of Spain to the top of bestseller lists, Taylor presents Orwell fully—as a writer, social critic, and human being.
 
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  1. Print length
    685 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Sticky notes
    On Kindle Scribe
  4. Publisher
    Open Road Media
  5. Publication date
    July 28, 2015
  6. File size
    3670 KB
  7. Page Flip
    Enabled
  8. Word Wise
    Enabled
  9. Enhanced typesetting
    Enabled
  10. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

George Orwell (1903-1950), ne Eric Blair, seemed only a marginal Depression-era writer about disillusion and hopelessness among ordinary working types until the Spanish Civil War, when in 1937 he was shot through the neck and nearly killed, furnishing him with the lens to see totalitarianism and betrayal as, possibly, the future human condition. In his now classic Homage to Catalonia, then a commercial failure, he wrote of papers reporting facts that were lies, patriotism that was propaganda, loyalty that was treachery, heroism that was cowardice. The results, in a bleak career abbreviated at 46 by unremitting tuberculosis, emerged in the dystopian fable Animal Farm and in the mean urban wasteland of 1984, in which history is rewritten daily, and obedience is the only recourse for the brainwashed powerless. Taylor, author of an earlier biography of Thackeray, limns Orwell's life graphically, and relates his early fiction and journalism persuasively to the iconic postwar novels, describing his writing as "an endless scroll constantly refined and brought up to date, in which early entries reemerge to assume an expected resonance." Tendencies to cliche disappear as Taylor warms up to his theme of an Etonian displaced in a remorseless world. A few brief chapters seem merely stuck in, but Orwell's essentially lonely and downstart life, and his triumphs almost too late to matter, make for compelling reading. 16 pages of b&w illus. not seen by PW.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"[This] book will probably emerge as the standard biography."
-The New York Times Book Review

"Taylor provides a subtle account of [Orwell's] struggle to create his literary persona." -Los Angeles Times Book Review

"A revelation . . . If any writer of the past century deserves another look in the 21st century, it is George Orwell." -Richmond Times-Dispatch

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B00Z8POMK6
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Open Road Media (July 28, 2015)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ July 28, 2015
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 3670 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 685 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.3 4.3 out of 5 stars 70 ratings

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D. J. Taylor

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Customer reviews

4.3 out of 5 stars
70 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

John Hunter
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Biogralphy
Reviewed in the United States on November 18, 2020
Verified Purchase
I wish this biography had existed when I taught Animal Farm, 1984 , To Shoot An Elephant and Politics and the English Language. I could have given my students more insight into Orwell's thoughts. This is a wonderful book that analalyzes life experience to the themes in Orwell's writings. This is a winner.
7 people found this helpful
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Valerie K. Thompson
4.0 out of 5 stars Orwell biography
Reviewed in the United States on October 5, 2009
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I ordered this for one of my students, so I appreciated the prompt shipment and the condition of the product. Thank you.
2 people found this helpful
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David J. B. Singer, MD
5.0 out of 5 stars Important read
Reviewed in the United States on September 18, 2019
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It's not enough to just read 1984 and/or Animal farm. One must also read his other works....check out "down and out in London and Paris...amazing book which might prevent you from eating in a fancy restaurant?
5 people found this helpful
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Seth J. Frantzman
5.0 out of 5 stars Orwell the centuries conscience
Reviewed in the United States on September 14, 2003
Orwell's work and his life should hang over us like the conscience of the 20th century. In the 20th century a series of ideological political thought systems came to the fore that tried to offer man salvation(since man had found no salvation in god for more then 2000 years and was tired of waiting). Socialism and its brother communism and fascism uised the new weapons and mass media of the day to crush humanity into slavery. Orwell first witnissed this in Spain when he saw Fascism confront COmmunism and seven Anarchism on the battlefield.
Orwells books Anamial Farm and 1984 show us a bleak world in which idealists control our daily lives and force us to do what we are told or risk death and imprisonedment(alla Stalinism). In some ways we must fear this as the future. With technology and weapons as powerful as they are the chances of us all becoming slaves to a dictatoprial government that wants us tot hink and act a certain way is ever present. Orwell came to understand the evils of communism(he had been a big slinging socialism when younger). Orwell, having died young, saw through a lens of humanity and pored into his few works the conscience of the 20th century.
This is a good read and this book renews our interest in orwell after so many years of his virtual eclipse.
9 people found this helpful
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S Riaz
3.0 out of 5 stars Orwell: The Life
Reviewed in the United States on March 4, 2015
I have never read a biography of Eric Blair (renamed for his career as a writer as George Orwell) before and so was deeply interested to read this, although I am not completely sure that – having finished it – I know much more about this enigmatic author than I did before I started. This tells the story of a life, from childhood, through his schooldays and career in the Burma police, then on to his career as a writer, his time in Spain, his relationships and his legacy. Of course, Orwell himself stipulated in his will that he did not want his biography written and you do wonder how much he did concern himself about the way his work and life would be viewed. So much of what we read seems to be part truth and part myth and, although the author is keen to always present the other side of possible events, it is never quite clear what the reality is. So, for example, we have Orwell’s time at prep school – the infamous St Cyprian’s, which he later savaged in print. The author suggests things were not quite as bad as Orwell suggested and points us in the direction of recollections by other past pupils of the school, but we are never really quite clear as to why his hatred was so extreme.

What we do see is that Orwell was a man who was painfully honest, often quite vulnerable (his attempts to woo women are almost tragically comic), quite sentimental and yet detached. It is obviously difficult for any author to gain access to the real man behind the image that Orwell wanted to project – even to his own friends at times. I enjoyed reading about his work in the context of his life, but I still feel that I only know about the main events. It would be interesting to read more biographies about this fascinating author, as I do still feel that I know very little about the man himself. Perhaps this is a good starting point though and it is certainly a very readable account of Orwell’s life.
15 people found this helpful
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Samuel Johnson
5.0 out of 5 stars The best of several Orwell bipgraphies
Reviewed in the United States on April 6, 2005
I have read many biographies of Orwell before encountering this one, but have learned more about Orwell the person in this book than in all of the others combined. Taylor's insight into the man and sparkling prose style make this a must read.
6 people found this helpful
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B. E. B.
2.0 out of 5 stars Too many words. Too few facts.
Reviewed in the United States on June 16, 2024
Verified Purchase
I don't like the author's style. Why use 3 words when 15 will do? I thought it was dull prose about a dull person, or at least the author made Orwell sound dull. The author jumps around a lot and is hard to follow. The author assumed the reader was familiar with all works of great literature and alluded to them without explanation. Sorry. I did not find the book enjoyable.
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Top reviews from other countries

E C
5.0 out of 5 stars As described
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 24, 2023
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As described and ahead of time
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craig minto
4.0 out of 5 stars ' The Life Of George '.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 19, 2019
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George Orwell was and still is a very important writer. Visionary and mesmerising, he still has great
influence to those who want to be authors today and schools who seek to educate their pupils in the
best of English literature.
George Orwell fought the corner of the oppressed, homeless and down trodden in the only way
he knew how. His books ' Road To Wigan Pier ',' Animal Farm' and of course 1984 all made the reader
think. They brought to light the suffering and injustice of the poor. I was most interested though in how
Orwell came to write my favourite book of his ' Keep The Aspidistra Flying '. The fine story of Gordon Comstock
who works in a dusty, poor book shop and has dreams of being a great poet. Gordon is a real rebel and a
true socialist. His relationship with his upper class friend Ravleston is a real wonder. Both characters are beautifully
drawn.
George Orwell had many jobs before breaking through to make his living as writer. He suffered too with his
poor health most of his life. But Orwell remains immortal for being able to make the public think and become aware of the poverty, distress and hardships of peoples lives.

Craig |Minto.
4 people found this helpful
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James H
5.0 out of 5 stars A strange literary world
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 3, 2003
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As you would expect from such an experienced biographer, DJ Taylor has brought a detailed insight to Orwell the man, possibly more accurately and comprehensively than others have done before. However, for me, what separates Taylor's book from his predecessors is his lifting the lid on the political positions taken by members of the pre war literary world in London. Orwells own excursion to fight in Spain was marred by internicene rivalry between various parts of the radical left, and the overtly political stance of publishers of the day just goes to show that nothing has changed.
DJ Taylor's style drew me easily into Orwell's world of contradictions and predjudices and I'm left with the feeling that he would have been a very uncomfortable man to know.
A compelling, if sometimes challenging, read.
17 people found this helpful
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SpiritofLakotaSioux
5.0 out of 5 stars A biography about one of the greatest literary giants of all time
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 18, 2015
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A biography about one of the greatest literary giants of all time. Well researched and put together and I learned a lot about what made Orwell tick and sparked his inspiration to write such timeless gems for all of us !
One person found this helpful
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M. Bond
3.0 out of 5 stars Fair but not great
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 19, 2018
Verified Purchase
Condition is fair but not as good as I had anticipated. Pages yellowed.
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