George Orwell Studies 8.1

Engaging Critically with a Writer who Can Still Surprise Us

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A striking new portrait of the author of Nineteen Eighty-Four by the Louth-based artist, Trevor Bounford, is on the cover of the latest, bumper issue of George Orwell Studies (Vol. 8, No. 1), guest-edited by Nathan Waddell.

The main papers are drawn from the Critical Orwell conference, hosted by the University of Birmingham. They include ‘Big Brother, Big Tech: Doctorow’s Little Brother and Huber’s Orwell’s Revenge’, by Jackson Ayres, ‘The Essayist’s Velvet Fist’, by Mir Ali Hosseini, ‘George Orwell’s Gandhi’, by Douglas Kerr, ‘What was Orwell’s Conception of Free Speech?’, by Mark Satta, ‘The Labyrinths of Nineteen Eighty-Four’, by Selina-Marie Scholz and Geoff Rodoreda , and ‘Critically Ill: George Orwell, Tragic Biography and the Crisis of Endings’, by Kristin Bluemel.

In his editorial, Dr Waddell, Associate Professor of English at the University of Birmingham, writes: ‘Each of the papers considers a fresh topic in Orwell’s life or considers a familiar emphasis from an innovative perspective. … All of them signal how much there’s still to learn about even the most well-trodden aspects of Orwell’s writing.’

In two additional papers, Martin Tyrrell considers ‘Orwell’s Irish Blindspot’ while Peter Brian Barry directs the spotlight on ‘George Orwell, Ayer and Russell and the Battle for the Soul of Philosophy’.

Darcy Moore continues to reveal hidden aspects of Orwell’s life in his essay focusing on the boyhood holidays in Cornwall. John Rodden pays tribute to Ian Angus, editor along with Sonia Orwell of the Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters. Hassan Akram looks critically at the BBC’s celebrated 1954 adaptation of Nineteen Eighty-Four; Richard Lance Keeble dissects Margaret Atwood’s imaginary interview with Orwell, while in another essay Rodden explores ‘Politics and the English language’ as a teaching tool.

In a new feature for the journal, two poems – by Paul Abdul Wadud Sutherland and David Punter – are carried.

A special section is given over to two tributes by Quentin Kopp and Darcy Moore to Dione Venable, the founder of The Orwell Society who died earlier this year.

Lively, informed book reviews consider George Orwell: The New Life, by D.J. Taylor; The Tramp in British Literature, 1850-1950, by Luke Lewin Davies; George Orwell’s Perverse Humanity: Socialism and Free Speech, by Glenn Burgess; and In Praise of Failure: Four Lessons in Humility, by Costica Bradatan.

And finally: New Pitcher (appropriately anonymous) launches a new diary item to intrigue and entertain Orwellians.

• George Orwell Studies, edited by Tim Crook and Richard Lance Keeble, is a peer-reviewed biannual journal, independent of The Orwell Society and published by Abramis, of Bury St Edmunds. To purchase (and subscribe), see http://www.abramis.co.uk/george-orwell-studies/subs.htm.