Coming Up for Air – DaneCobain.com

George Orwell – Coming Up for Air | Review

Author: George Orwell

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 247

Rating: 8/10

George Orwell – Coming Up for Air

Coming Up for Air might not be as well-known as Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty Four, but it’s a firm favourite amongst serious Orwell fans and scholars, and I can see why. The book follows the story of George Bowling, a man in his mid-forties who’s described as “not a fool, but not a highbrow either”. He has a normal job and lives a normal life, but he’s facing a dilemma – he’s unsure whether to embrace the modern world or to flee from it.

Of course, this ‘modern world’ is 1939, and so it’s not exactly the same as what we’ve come to think of as modernity, but the essence of the struggle is something that we can all relate to in the days of the internet and the smartphone. Some of us are luddites, trying to resist the impending march of the computer chip; others are technologists, who leap at the chance to try out the latest gadget.

But at its essence, Coming Up for Air is also a great tale in its own right, even if you don’t bother to dig into it too deeply. That also means it’s the sort of book that can be re-read, because you see new layers every time. Sure, read Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty Four first, but make sure that you come back for this afterwards.

George Orwell

Click here to buy Coming Up for Air.

George Orwell – Keep the Aspidistra Flying | Review

Title: Keep the Aspidistra Flying

Author: George Orwell

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 264

Rating: 6/10

George Orwell – Keep the Aspidistra Flying

This is Orwell at his more traditional, the Orwell of Coming Up for Air and not the Orwell of Animal Farm and 1984. But saying that, despite the more old-school approach to narrative, Keep the Aspidistra Flying is not without its political messages.

Gordon Comstock is a published poet, just about. His first book of poetry, called ‘Mice‘, sold several hundred copies and then stopped selling, and London Pleasures, his masterpiece, has stagnated. Sick of capitalism and sick of society, Gordon quits his job as a copywriter at an advertising agency and takes a job at a book shop, for poor wages and long hours.

George Orwell

Orwell’s novel charts his progress through working-class London, as he tries to woo a young woman called Rosemary on a shoestring budget – he just can’t go back to the old firm, that would mean admitting defeat to the money god.

While it’s a good story, it tends to drag on a bit and Gordon starts to grate on your nerves – he’s arrogant and a bit of a bastard. It’s always hard to read a book when you dislike the protagonist, but you do so anyway because it’s Orwell and his writing is still compelling.

But then you get to the ending, and you wonder if it was all worth it. It’s sudden, and a letdown in some inexplicable way. I’ll say no more, I don’t want to ruin it. ’cause you’re still going to read it, right?