Francis Miville with some interesting takes on George Orwell:
In 1984, George Orwell’s initial intention was the portrayal of a future dystopia due to some form of Anglo Left politics having turned as sour as in USSR, otherwise he would have boisterously deserted the socialist cause like Solzhenitsyn, which he never did at any point of his life.
In Orwell’s earlier social realist novels, he felt that such novels should differ from reality only by their place and personal names so as not to offend individuals uselessly. This was an important point of the doctrine of social realism at that time.
This manner of writing allowed him to pass under the scissors of many censors both in his publishing house and at government level. His adherence to this model was so severe that many stories suffered from a loss of up to of 50
He wrote 1984 using the most striking and beautiful of these scissored out pages in a rather distant and very improbable, fantastic context. This context was that of a second kind of USSR overtaking the West.
Actually the culture of the Anglo world at that time was more conservative and Baden-Powellish than ever in all aspects, even among the socialists, due to the very regressive influence of the conservative US and the rejection of all revolutionary ideas by the Stalinist USSR itself.
In reality all scenes of 1984 had been experienced and witnessed by the author himself in his younger age as a civil servant of the British Empire in the Indian Subcontinent as well as in the British Isles proper.
All of 1984’s scenes were a description of the late Victorian and Early Edwardian British society. Just let that sink in for a moment! This can be verified by George Orwell’s own abundant correspondence. The Early Edwardian world was as austere and rationed for nearly all people except an oligarchy even smaller than the “inner party” of his novel. This was a worse oligarchy than those of many poorer countries in Europe or in the tropics.
I actually thought Francis was a Black woman for awhile. I’ve read many of his posts here and there. I like hearing about different groups and Francis delivers.
I actually thought Francis was a Black woman for awhile
No, he’s a guy about my age who lives in Toronto, Canada. I believe he is a native French speaker. He spent a lot of time down in Haiti, and I think he even fell in love with a woman down there. I like him a lot! He’s one Hell of a thinker and writer. I’m not sure if he’s correct on a lot of his views, but these are new views to me, and it’s absolutely fascinating to read these brilliant new takes on important things.
I was mistaken, big time. Yeah, many of his posts are fascinating.