04/29/2024

This invigorating study from historian Beers (Red Ellen) investigates what George Orwell’s life and writings can teach contemporary readers about modern controversies. Charting the development of Orwell’s politics and philosophy, Beers notes that the author had become by his own account “a bit Bolshie” while attending the elite Eton boarding school, and that witnessing Britain’s oppressive regime in Burma while enlisted in the Indian Police Service “awakened his social conscience.” Evaluating competing ideological claims to Orwell’s legacy, Beers argues that Orwell would have regarded skeptically individuals who invoke his name (and his dystopian novel, 1984) to complain about being de-platformed by social media companies for politically contentious views, citing Orwell’s belief that his publisher had been within its rights to renege on their agreement to put out Homage to Catalonia in the late 1930s because it feared the report would undermine the anti-Franco cause in Spain. Beers has a knack for finding fresh angles on the much discussed author, highlighting both his overlooked sense of humor and the less savory aspects of his character, including his failure to consider the oppression of women in his writings on inequality and his disrespect for “women’s boundaries and bodily autonomy” (he made “repeated unwelcome advances on women” and opposed abortion). This is a valuable exploration of what it actually means to be “Orwellian.” (June)

"Laura Beers’s reassessment of George Orwell’s legacy seamlessly weaves past and present to offer insightful lessons and cautions for our own time."

"With all and sundry taking Orwell’s name in vain these days, it is timely to have a reminder of who he was and what he believed in, and also how his body of work can help us understand the world we live in now. Just the insight it offers to his work beyond the best-known titles makes Orwell’s Ghosts well worth reading."

"Laura Beers’s book shows how Orwell’s often forgotten socialist politics ought to matter to his legacy—and how the anti-racism and feminism of our present demonstrate Orwell’s limitations. The wonderful results suggest that the relation between past and present is anything but simple."

"A perfectly timed and desperately needed book."

"Lucid, engaging…The complexity (and sheer volume) of Orwell's work means that he has frequently been misunderstood. Beers reaches a satisfying synthesis."

"A succinct, wide-ranging work…concluding with a reminder to those on the political left that they can only achieve their aims 'through common endeavor' with others."

"A brilliantly insightful study of George Orwell. All those interested in Orwell and our world today should read this book."

"Nearly three quarters of a century after George Orwell’s death, ‘Orwellian’ is one of the most misused adjectives in the lexicon. In this fascinating and timely study, Laura Beers teases out the real meaning of the word and its implications for the social and political arrangements of the twenty-first century."

"Laura Beers reveals how Orwell’s politics, shaped by the tragedies of the first half of the twentieth century, can be brought to bear to understand our own age of insecurity. An essential read."

"Laura Beers rescues Orwell from 'two-dimensional caricature,' to present one of our greatest novelists and essayists warts and all. Beers reveals how Orwell's politics, shaped by the tragedies of the first half of the twentieth century, can be brought to bear to understand our own age of insecurity. An essential read."

Tanya Eby gives a clear delivery in a precise style. She is an intelligent narrator who skillfully paces this heady appraisal of the famed English author George Orwell. These days the term "Orwellian" seems to be equally availed by the right, left, and center, all of whom appropriate his two most famous novels, ANIMAL FARM and 1984. This tightly argued, biographically based audiobook looks at the lasting influence of Orwell's complex ideas, which are too often considered to be simply anti-Soviet or libertarian. Unafraid to consider the writer as a whole, Beers points out: "He was a socialist but decidedly not a feminist." Beers reexamines Orwell's lesser-known reportage and reviews to make sense of our own era. His legacy is further burnished by this audiobook. A.D.M. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine