Michael Shelden News Today

Human life is very complicated. All of us are constrained by and sometimes hostage to things we cannot easily control or change and might be unwilling to change even if we could. In the new biography of George Orwell's first wife, Eileen, author Anna Funder seems oblivious that factors other than a pernicious patriarchy might have shaped their relationship

Anna Funder explains how the search for Eileen O’Shaughnessy, a compelling figure strangely absent from Orwell’s writing, illuminated her own life

Leading authority on the life of George Orwell who edited the mammoth 20-volume George Orwell: The Complete Works

The once home to the newly wed Sir Winston is available to let to those with deep pockets

An article by Raymond S. Solomon about Stalinist repression during the Spanish Civil War.

30th April 2020 by George Orwell and Fatherhood: Part One The most important influence on George Orwell was probably his father. This essay, then, explores the crucial theme of fatherhood in a number of contrasting ways. It first examines the responses of both Orwell and his contemporaries to his father. It then looks at the many fascinating representations of fathers in his novels. Orwell’s own strikingly progressive attitudes as a dad are highlighted as are, finally, the responses of his s...

Share Two summers ago, I found myself on a whale-watching journey in Provincetown, Massachusetts, where I was teaching at the Fine Arts Work Center. We swayed from one side of the ship to the other to observe various species—fins, minkes, and humpbacks—performing synchronized acrobatics in waters where fishing nets threaten. Tranquil, playful, spouting fountains of ocean spray and then plunging under, they seemed not at all the wicked beasts that history had taught us to fea...

P.M. on The Paris Review ’s Instagram account. For more details, visit our events page, or scroll down to the bottom of the article. Photo: Erica MacLean. Whenever I would tell someone I was cooking from Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick for my next column, they would gleefully shriek, “Whale steaks!” And I would dither a bit and explain that no, those are illegal in America, and that I was instead planning to make two forms of chowder, clam and cod, that weren’t going to be very differen...

Has any other novelist lived a life so steeped in political intrigue? Evening Standard/Getty Images March 10, 2021 The last novelist who acted like he might save the world may have been Graham Greene. He belonged to a generation of writers who might not always share the same political opinions but who supported many of the same causes: defending jailed dissidents, protesting illegal wars, and challenging the unfairness (or even stupidity) of censoring great books. He wrote a novel, The Comedia...

books and culture A Definitive Dig in the Graham Greene Quarry In brisk, cinematic prose reminiscent of the author’s own, Richard Greene shows his subject both fair criticism and sympathy. Arts and Culture In this witty, elegant, revelatory biography, Richard Greene states that his “book takes a very high view of Graham Greene’s accomplishments, and so endorses the common opinion of three generations of writers and critics that he is one of the most important figures in m...