Down & Out

It's late June 2011 in Chicago, which means it's 64 degrees and cloudy outside.

My goal this summer is to read three George Orwell books. Up until about a month ago I had only read Keep the Aspidistra Flying, which I loved, and Animal Farm, which was just about exactly what I expected - neither here nor there, and perhaps more culturally relevant as a symbol than as a work of literature.

I've heard great things about Orwell the nonfiction writer, so a few weeks ago I began Down and Out in Paris and London. After finishing it last night, I have mixed feelings. Orwell as a writer is impressive and does a particularly good job of removing traces of his ego from the book while simultaneously managing to make a few cutting observations and recommendations about the problem of the underclass. And when he does decide to make indictments on society, his words cut right to the point and still appear startlingly relevant even today, 80 years later and across the Atlantic. My problem with the book is that there are too few of these moments. Much of the book is simple narrative, detailing the events of workhouses and the squalid hotel kitchens of Paris. Perhaps to an upper-class Londoner reading in the 1930s the details would elicit shock, but as a desensitized 21st century reader, even disgusting set pieces like overflowing chamber pots seem run-of-the-mill.

My next Orwell book will be Homage to Catalonia, which I'll start right after I finish the second book in the Hunger Games trilogy.

Fun Fact: I only recently learned that Orwell's given name was Eric Blair. I went to school back in Ninety Six with a kid named Eric Blair, a kid who never struck me as even remotely literary. Eric, if you ever read this, please tell me you were aware of your namesake back in first grade and only acted the fool in other to rebel against your parents' wishes that you live up to your moniker.