Abstract

Orwell: Pessimistic Liberal

This article presents brief information on two books, "The Orwell Reader," by Richard H. Rovere and "A Study of George Orwell," by Christopher Hollis. "The Orwell Reader," reflects his oppressive awareness of the fragility of human dignity. To Orwell, the possibilities of existence were as ambiguous as the elegance of the Paris dining room, described in Down and Out in Paris and London, where food was brought in from a filthy scullery separated from it by no more than a swinging door and a straightening of the waiter's shoulders. Hollis' study of Orwell raises the question of whether personal acquaintance combined with fundamental disagreement is the best qualification for a critic. Hollis seems bent on making Orwell the subject of a posthumous conversion. Hollis undertakes to refute Orwell's objections to religion in general and Catholicism in particular Orwell classed Catholicism.