Blair , Eric Arthur , 1903-1950 , novelist and journalist known as George Orwell

Born in Motihari, Bengal, India, 25 June 1903; educated at Eton, 1917-1921; served in Burma in the Indian Imperial Police, 1922-1928; lived for several years in poverty, as a dish-washer in Paris, France, and as a tramp in England, 1928-1931; school teacher at the Hawthorns, Middlesex, 1932-1933; part-time assistant in a Hampstead bookshop, London, 1934-1935; wrote books and novels, 1933-1949; married Eileen Maud O'Shaughnessy (died 1945), 1936; reviewer of novels for the New English Weekly, until 1940; visited areas of mass unemployment in Lancashire and Yorkshire, 1936; wounded in Spain fighting for the Republicans, 1937; member of the Home Guard during World War Two; worked for the British Broadcasting Corporation Eastern Service, 1940-1943; Literary Editor of Tribune, 1943-1945; war correspondent for the Observer, 1945; regular contributor to the Manchester Evening News, 1943-1946; suffered from tuberculosis, often in hospital, 1947-1950; married Sonia Mary Brownell, 1949; died, 21 January 1950. Publications: Down and out in Paris and London (Victor Gollancz, London, 1933); Burmese days (Harper & Brothers, New York, 1934); The road to Wigan pier (Victor Gollancz, London, 1937); Homage to Catalonia (Secker & Warburg, London, 1938); Coming up for air (Victor Gollancz, London, 1939); The lion and the unicorn (Secker & Warburg, London, 1941); Animal farm (Secker & Warburg, London, 1945); Critical essays (Secker & Warburg, London, 1946); The English people (Collins, London, 1947); Nineteen eighty-four (Secker & Warburg, London, 1949); Shooting an elephant, and other essays (Secker & Warburg, London, 1950).