Why I Write

George Orwell set out 'to make political writing into an art', and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature - his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell's essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership.
In Why I Write, the first in the Orwell's Essays series, Orwell describes his journey to becoming a writer, and his movement from writing poems to short stories to the essays, fiction and non-fiction we remember him for. He also discusses what he sees as the 'four great motives for writing' - 'sheer egoism', 'aesthetic enthusiasm', 'historical impulse' and 'political purpose' - and considers the importance of keeping these in balance. Why I Write is a unique opportunity to look into Orwell's mind, and it grants the reader an entirely different vantage point from which to consider the rest of the great writer's oeuvre.

Born Eric Arthur Blair (1903-1950), George Orwell was an English journalist, writer and critic. Orwell devoted his life to working against extremism, and in his description of how authoritarian regimes pervade our thoughts, he gave us a new vocabulary to understand totalitarianism. He is best remembered today for his innumerable essays, his novels - in particular Animal Farm and 1984 - and his longer non-fiction, especially The Road to Wigan Pier and Down Out in Paris and London.