Was Orwell ever a fascist?

[kev67]

Well, was he?


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:OrwellBurmaPassport.jpg

[Emil Miller]

Well, was he?


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:OrwellBurmaPassport.jpg

Well considering he fought against and was wounded by them in the Spanish Civil War, I think the answer must be no.

[Shevek]

Well considering he fought against and was wounded by them in the Spanish Civil War, I think the answer must be no.

Not to mention his thoughts on fascism and nationalism more generally.... why would anyone think he was a fascist?

[Volya]

I believe Charlie Chaplin had a similar moustache, and I don't think he was a fascist either.

[cafolini]

I don't think he was a fascist. But I think he thought fascism could take over. He didn't see the impossibility of its utter stupidity being a long term state. Either that or he was an English double agent admiting the idiotic power of the fascist in order to entangle them in the ridiculous proposition of which they were capable. That's more likely.
Moves like that were not uncommon in the UK. The Episcopal church, for example, declared itself Catholic but not Roman Catholic, or Greek Orthodox. Thus they took on a platform that made the Roman Catholic fascists look ridiculos. Venice was finished and, of course, Spain also, not to speak of the vestiges in Germany. Today, the Episcopal church is an antifascist, antiracist institution and here to stay.

[kev67]

I believe Charlie Chaplin had a similar moustache, and I don't think he was a fascist either.

Good point, was Orwell a Charlie Chaplin fan then?

[Emil Miller]

Good point, was Orwell a Charlie Chaplin fan then?

Here's Orwell on Chaplin's The Great dictator


Speaking of Chaplin in his role of The Great Dictator, George Orwell asks “What is Chaplin’s peculiar gift?” It is his power to stand for a sort of concentrated essence of the common man, for the ineradicable belief in decency that exists in the hearts of ordinary people, at any rate in the West. We live in a period in which democracy is almost everywhere in retreat, supermen in control of three-quarters of the world, liberty explained away by sleek professors, Jew-baiting defended by pacifists. And yet everywhere, the common man sticks obstinately to the beliefs that he derives from the Christian culture.”

--Film Review, The Great Dictator in Time & Tide, Dec 21, 1940



But here's Orwell 1n 1949.

The recent evidence about Orwell's life seems to show that our greatest modern political writer could embody glaringly contradictory positions.

Only four years ago, his image as Left-wing campaigner against state oppression took something of a battering when it was revealed that in 1949 he had secretly passed to the Government a list of 37 figures in public life whom he regarded as Soviet sympathisers.

On this list were names such as the film star Charlie Chaplin, the actor Michael Redgrave and the historian E. H. Carr.


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-480187/Was-George-Orwell-patriot-traitor.html#ixzz2DziEKAKI
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[kev67]

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-480187/Was-George-Orwell-patriot-traitor.html#ixzz2DziEKAKI
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Not a bad essay for the Daily Mail.

[OrphanPip]

If you had to define Orwell's political leanings, he was a democratic socialist who mellowed in later life to a moderate labour orientation.

Also, Orwell had that toothbrush moustache in the 20s before people really knew who Hitler was, and it wasn't associated with fascism. It was a relatively popular style of moustache (Lord knows why) before Hitler kind of ruined it.

[kev67]

Also, Orwell had that toothbrush moustache in the 20s before people really knew who Hitler was, and it wasn't associated with fascism. It was a relatively popular style of moustache (Lord knows why) before Hitler kind of ruined it.

Well, it has just been Movember. Perhaps it is time to rehabilitate the style. Or maybe not...

[Emil Miller]

Well, it has just been Movember. Perhaps it is time to rehabilitate the style. Or maybe not...

The way things are going, it might be due for a comeback.

[cafolini]

The way things are going, it might be due for a comeback.

Yeah. With you as commander in chief. ROFLMAO!!

[Emil Miller]

Yeah. With you as commander in chief. ROFLMAO!!

Rolling on the floor eh? Thanks for the warning, I'll have to look where I'm treading.

[TheGoodNews]

"As far as my personal preferences went I would have liked to join the Anarchists." George Orwell - Homage to Catalonia page 116.

"In every country in the world a huge tribe of party-hacks and sleek little professors are busy 'proving' that Socialism means no more than a planned state-capitalism with grab-motive left intact. But fortunately there also exists a vision of Socialism quite different from this." George Orwell - Homage to Catalonia page 104.

"If I had understood the situation a bit better I should probably have joined the Anarchists." George Orwell - The Collected Essays; Volume I page 289.

Seriously doubt that he was ever a fascist.

[The Atheist]

He wasn't.

Orwell hated fascism above all, which leads to the answer to this:




...The recent evidence about Orwell's life seems to show that our greatest modern political writer could embody glaringly contradictory positions.

Only four years ago, his image as Left-wing campaigner against state oppression took something of a battering when it was revealed that in 1949 he had secretly passed to the Government a list of 37 figures in public life whom he regarded as Soviet sympathisers....


The article misses a ridiculously obvious point - Orwell knew that the USSR in 1949 bore no relationship to actual communism, and had become a fascist state. Given his authoring both 1984 and Animal Farm, it would be more surprising if he hadn't turned people in whom he suspected of collaboration.

Somewhat ironic, sure, but not contradictory to his political opinions at all.

[TheGoodNews]

It seems no one bothered to note the quotes I left above. Orwell understood the difference between socialism and the State Capitalist state that was the Soviet Union.

"In Catalonia, for the first few months, most of the actual power was in the hands of the Anarcho-Syndicalists, who controlled most of the key industries. The thing that happened in Spain was, in fact, not merely a civil war, but the beginning of a revolution. It is this fact that the anti-Fascist press outside of Spain has made it its special business to obscure."