GEORGE ORWELL was the pen name of the English author, Eric Arthur Blair. Orwell was educated in England at EtonCollege. After service with the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, he returned to Europe to become a writer. He lived for several years in poverty. His earliest experiences resulted in the book, Down and Out in Paris and London.

By 1936, Orwell had joined the Republican forces in the Spanish Civil War. Orwell was critical of Communism but basically considered himself a Socialist. He was wounded wu:nded – zraněn) in the fighting. Late in the war, Orwell fought the Communists and eventually had to flee (uprchnout) Spain for his life. Orwell documented many of his experiences during the Spanish Civil War in his Homage(homidž – čest) to Catalonia.

Orwell's various experiences with totalitarian political regimes (rei’ži:m) had a direct impact on his prose. Orwell's best-known books reflect his opposition to totalitarianism: Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four.

During the Second World War, Orwell wrote a weekly radio political commentary, designed to counter German and Japanese propaganda in India. His wartime work for the BBC gave him a solid taste of bureaucratic (bju:rokratic) hypocrisy. Many believe that this experience provided the inspiration for his invention (myšlenka) of "newspeak," the truth-denying language of Big Brother's rule in his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.

Throughout his lifetime, the great English author continually questioned all "official" or "accepted" versions of history. At the conclusion of the war in Europe, Orwell expressed doubt about the Allied account of events and posed the following question in his book Notes on Nationalism, "If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear... Is it true about the gas ovens in Poland?"

Orwell died in London at the early age of forty-seven of a neglected (niglekt – zanedbání) lung ailment. He left behind a substantial body of work and a reputation for greatness.

1984

1984 was a bitter protest against the nightmarish (hrůzný) future and corruption of truth and free speech of the modern world. In the story, Britannia has become Airstrip One in the superstate Oceania, which is controlled by Big Brother and the Party. "The Party seeks (požaduje) power entirely for its own sake (jen pro sebe) . We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely (souli – pouze) in power."(from Nineteen Eighty-Four) The Party's agents constantly rewrite history. The official language is Newspeak, and the society is dominated by such slogans as "War is Peace", "Freedom is Slavery", "Ignorance is Strength." The hero, Winston Smith, a minor Party operative, rewrites the past at the Ministry of Truth. He keeps a secret diary and has a brief love affair with a girl named Julia. He believes that O'Brien, a member of the Inner Party, is not sympathetic to Big Brother. O'Brien enrolls (zapsat) him and Julia in a conspiracy (spiknutí). One day Winston is arrested by the Thought Police, tortured and brainwashed. O'Brien directs Winston's torture and rehabilitation and tells that Goldstein is the invention of the Party. His spirit broken, Winston learns to love Big Brother. Winston and Julia meet briefly one day, they both have gone through the process and have lost their former love for each other. Some critics have related Smith's sufferings to those the author underwent at preparatory school - Winston is finally broken by rats. Orwell has said that the book was written "to alter other people's idea of the kind of society they should strive after (pokoušet se).

George Orwell – Animal Farm

George Orwell's Animal Farm is a short, easily readable story with valuable lessons about how political and governmental organizations often work. Orwell wrote it as a parable (podobenství) about the Russian Revolution, as an example of how a revolutionary government could be worse than its monarchist predecessor (předchůdce – pri:disisr), but it also could apply to many political organizations, labour unions, and the like. The key lesson is that the organization's bosses often manipulate the organization for their own benefit, and end up being as bad, if not worse, than the real or imaginary evils from which they are protecting their followers.

The farm animals who inhabit the Manor Farm are mistreated (týrat) and abused by Farmer Jones. The animals rebel, expel (vyhnat) Jones, and take over the farm, which they rename Animal Farm. Soon, however, the pigs (who represent the party bosses) begin to take special privileges (privilidž) for themselves, e.g. extra food. They enlist the farm's dogs as enforcers to put down any dissent, and they teach the sheep to speak the party line on demand. At first, this is, "Four legs good, two legs bad"- animals (four legs) are good, humans (exploiters - vykořisťovatelé) are bad.

As time passes, the Seven Commandments (Animal Farm's Constitution) undergoes subtle changes as the pigs rewrite it to suit their own agenda. When Boxer the horse (symbolizing blue-collar labour, the "workers,") becomes too old to work, the pigs sell him to the horse butcher, whom they tell the other animals, he is really the veterinarian. The pigs eventually learn to walk on two legs, thus imitating the animals' original exploiters, and they teach the sheep to bleat, "Four legs good, two legs better!" The Seven Commandments become one: "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." The pigs rename Animal Farm the Manor Farm- its original name- and invite the neighbouring human farmers, who symbolize the elite class against whom the animals revolted, to admire the results: "...the lower animals on Animal Farm did more work and received less food than any animals in the county." As the story ends, the pigs become indistinguishable (nerozeznatelný) from their human visitors.

The Seven Commandments, Animal Farm's original Constitution

  1. Whatever goes on two legs is an enemy.
  2. Whatever goes on four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
  3. No animal shall wear clothes.
  4. No animal shall sleep in a bed.
  5. No animal shall drink alcohol.
  6. No animal shall kill any other animal.
  7. All animals are equal.

The Seven Commandments, after the pigs' "revisions"

  1. "Four legs good, two legs better!"
  2. No animal shall sleep in a bed with sheets.
  3. No animal shall drink alcohol to excess.
  4. No animal shall kill any other animal without cause.
  5. All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.