Friday, January 22 2010
Curse Ye, Orwell!
Orwell declared that there are “four great motives” for writing: sheer egoism, aesthetic enthusiasm, historical impulse, and political purpose. As for the rest of us...
Friday, June 19 2009
Bumming Smokes in Paris and London: George Orwell’s Obsession with Tobacco
Cigarette smoke so permeates George Orwell’s stories it almost leaves stains on one’s fingers when reading his books.
Thursday, December 18 2008
George Orwell: Forgiving and Championing Bad Art
Orwell's essays remind us that better than our best intentions is our inescapable nature, our shared ordinariness, which will always have the potential to redeem us all if only we will embrace it.
Wednesday, December 3 2008
It’s All Part of Der Process
Of course, it scarcely suffices to look at what we’ve wrought at Guantánamo and abroad and call it Orwellian or Kafkaesque.
Tuesday, August 19 2008
Me, Myself & BBCi: Who’s Watching Whom
The extensive use of mirrors in the Big Brother house behind which many of the cameras are hidden means that when the contestants hear the voice of authority, it is their own reflexion that they see back.
