George Orwell

In this Essay, I will present the Life and the works of George Orwell who offers a portrait of a political writer whose major themes are man and his state, surely among the most significant issues of the 20th century experience. The most important thing to know before the beginning of this Essay is that Orwell identified himself as a democratic Socialist and a "political animal", deeply involved in the crises and movement of his day. In order to illustrate George Orwell as a political writer, we will mostly support the thesis with the most appropriated Essay: "Politics and the English Language".

First of all, we have to say that George Orwell is always inspirited and motivated by politics. All his works come from a political situation. Even his imaginative literary masterpieces , powerful expressions of his deeply held belief in the evil of totalitarianism and his conviction that danger resides where people turn from clear thinking and blindly follow orthodoxies. In"Politics and the English Language" we are asked to consider the connection between corrupted language and political manipulation. In other terms, we are asked to consider whether "ugly" language contributes to muddy thinking. Orwell believes it does, although the process is anything but simple. Political and economics pressures produce ugly language, which then produces foolish thinking; but then, foolish thinking produces even uglier language, and the cycle continues. For Orwell, this was not a purely philosophical or academic problem; the Essay moves towards a position which links the degeneration of language with the rise of totalitarianism.

The second point to develop is the connection between "politics and the English Language" and the previous material on propaganda. The previous material instructed you to recognize the tools of the propagandist, how he uses the language. In fact, he uses the language with euphemism, you name it to manipulate and gain influence. George Orwell doesn't specifically discuss "propaganda" by that exact term; he makes the case that political writing is "bad" because, like propaganda, it renders language practically meaningless, muddying though and destroying rational decision-making. His essay analyzes the corrosive trends in the writing of his day, but decades later, we can still share his disgust and still find